JiipBrltlfii 



IS 



Milm 



ND'HEJVRING 



Ift. 


'i 

f 

j 



SEEING AND HEARING 



SEEING 
AND HEARING 



BY 



GEORGE W. E. RUSSELL 

AUTHOR OF "collections AND RECOLLECTIONS," ETC. 



NEW YORK 
E. P. BUTTON ^ CO. 

1907 






Printed by 

Ballantyne, Hanson 6r> Co. 

Edinburgh 






TO 

WALTER SYDNEY SICHEL 

1868-1907 



' ' Ay, there are some good things in life^ that fall not 
anuay ivith the rest. 
And of all best things upon earth , I hold that a faith- 
ful friend is the best. " 

— Owen Meredith. 



CONTENTS 



CHAP. 
I. 


The Coronation . . . . . 


PAGE 

I 


II. 


Secret Societies .... 


lO 


III. 


The Irish Peerage 


17 


IV. 


Omitted Silhouettes . 


25 


V. 


Doctors and Doctoring 


31 


VI. 


Mourning 


39 


VII. 


Wills ...... 


46 


VIII. 


Pensions 


54 


IX. 


The Season as it was . 


. 62 


X. 


The Season as it is . 


69 


XI. 


The Sins of Society 


. 76 


XII. 


Oxford 


. ^3 


XIII. 


Schools for Shepherds 


90 


XIV. 


Pilgrimages 


• 97 


XV. 


The Public Schools 


105 


XVI. 


Schools and Boarding-Houses . 


113 


XVII. 


Squares 


121 


XVIII. 


Sunday in London 


128 


XIX. 


A Suburban Sunday 


135 


XX. 


Wine and Water .... 


143 


XXI. 


Dinner 


• 151 


XXII. 


Dinners 


158 


XXIII. 


Luncheon 


166 


XXIV. 


Tea 


174 


XXV. 


Supper 


182 



Vll 



Vlll 

CHAP 

XXVI 
XXVII. 
XXVIII. 
XXIX. 
XXX. 
XXXI. 
XXXII. 
XXXIII. 
XXXIV. 
XXXV. 
XXXVI. 
XXXVII. 
XXXVIII. 
XXXIX. 
XL. 
XLI. 
XLII. 
XLIII. 
XLIV. 
XLV. 
XLVI. 
XLVII. 
XLVIII. 
XLIX. 
L. 
LI. 
LII. 
LIII. 



CONTENTS 

. Inns and Hotels 
Travel 

Accomplishments 
Cider . 
The Garter 
Sheriffs 
Publishers . 
Handwriting 
Autographs 
More Autographs 
Christmas . 
New Year's Day 
Pets 

Purple and Fine Linen 
Prelacy and Palaces 
Horrors 

Social Changes . 
Social Graces 
Publicity v. Reticence 
Town v. Country 
Home .... 
Hospitality. 
Ostentation 

Principle and Prejudice 
Culture 
Religion 
Superstition 
The Remnant 



THE CORONATION 

And so the great Act draws near — the ^^high 
midsummer pomp " of Patriotism and Regality 
and Religion — the ^' one far-off divine event " to 
which the whole social creation has moved since 
the day was appointed and the preparations 
began. A thousand pens will picture the Coro- 
nation as it actually occurs. Writing in advance, 
I can only contemplate it as a magnificent ideal, 
and describe it as it strikes not the eye and ear 
but the heart, the imagination, and the historic 
sense. 

First and foremost and above all else, the Coro- 
nation is a religious act. It is imbedded in the 
very heart of the great Christian service of the 
Holy Eucharist. Litany and Introit and Gospel 
and Creed lead up to it, and it in turn leads on 
to Te Deum and Offertory and Consecration and 
Communion. But though (or perhaps because) 
it is thus supremely and conspicuously religious, 
the Coronation is national and secular and his- 
torical as well. Other nations do not crown their 
Sovereigns. Some have no crowns to give, and 

A 



2 SEEING AND HEARING 

others are in doubt about the rightful recipients ; 
in some, revolutions have shattered the imme- 
morial landmarks, or the sharp sword of civil war 
has severed the sacred thread of succession, or the 
State itself is a mushroom growth of yesterday, 
with no roots and fibres striking deep down to 
the bedrock of the national Hfe. 

But here in England we crown our kings as 
we have crowned them for a thousand years, and 
our act of crowning is the august symbol of a 
nation's story and a people's will. For before ever 
the ministers of God approach the altar, before 
the sacred emblems of sovereignty are hallowed, 
before the Christian's Mysteries begin, before the 
Eternal Spirit is invoked and the consecrating 
unction bestowed, the English people plays its 
part, and, through the mouth of its chief citizen 
asserts its fundamental place in the system of the 
Kingly Commonwealth. 

Sirs, I here present unto you King Edward, 
the undoubted King of this realm ; wherefore all 
you who are come this day to do your homage, 
are you willing to do the same ? " And, as the 
King stands up and turns and shows himself four 
times to the assembled freemen, they ^' signify their 
willingness and joy by loud and repeated acclama- 
tions, all with one voice crying out, ' God Save 
King Edward.' " 

And here I borrow from one ^ who touches as no 

1 H. S. Holland, D.D. 



THE CORONATION 3 

other living man can touch these dramatic solem- 
nities of our national life (for I know he will 
consent to the borrowing), and I say that this is 
as noble as it is intelligible. <' It embodies the 
splendid liberty with which a free people asserts its 
claim to have nothing imposed upon it in the dark, 
no tyrannous rule set over it which it has not 
measured and considered and acknowledged in the 
open light of Heaven." And then the whole great 
company falls to prayer, and the Archbishop, who 
has hitherto played his part as the first citizen of 
England and the greatest subject of the Crown, 
takes up a still higher function, and goes up, vested 
to the altar and begins the Service of the Eucharist, 
and, as a priest, invokes the supreme sanction of 
the Eternal. And then the majestic course of the 
rite is broken off in the very centre, and, with 
every act and feature and ceremony which can 
most forcibly express the solemnity of the trans- 
action, the Archbishop demands of the King, in 
the face of God and the Church and the people, 
whether he will promise to rule England in due 
obedience to law and with sacred regard to Justice, 
Mercy, and Religion. And the King gives his 
promise, and, kneeling at the altar, confirms it 
with an oath upon the Holy Gospel. 

'^ This free intercourse that passes between Ruler 
and Ruled is no child's play, no mere pretty cere- 
monial ; it is the act of men in solemn earnest 
pledging their troth the one to the other. The 



4 SEEING AND HEARING 

act is broad and deep and strong as the national 
life. It embodies the experience of centuries. It 
has in it the stern breath of conflict and the 
anxious determinations of secured peace. The 
Great Charter is behind it; and the memories of 
Runnymede and Whitehall. It seals a concen- 
trated purpose. King and people look each other 
in the face, and speak their minds out and give 
their word." And then, and not till then, the 
Archbishop will go forward with his hallowing 
office and perform the symbolic acts, and pro- 
nounce the benediction of the Highest upon the 
covenant between King and Commonwealth. He 
anoints with the sacred unction and girds with the 
kingly sword. He delivers the sceptre of empire 
and the emblematic orb which, '^ set under the 
Cross," reminds the King ^< that the whole world 
is subject to the power and empire of Christ our 
Redeemer." And then the crown, of pure gold 
enriched with gems each one of which is a history, 
is set upon the Sovereign's head, and the Arch- 
bishop blesses and the onlookers acclaim. 

" Blow, trumpets ; all your exultations blow !" 

as King Edward VII. takes his seat on the throne 
of the Confessor and the Conqueror, of the Plan- 
tagenets and the Tudors, and receives by the mouth 
of all that is greatest in Church and State the proud 
homage of a self-governing people. 

And then, once again, the splendid trappings of 



THE CORONATION 5 

sovereignty are laid aside, and the King, un- 
crowned, kneels down like the lowliest son of 
Adam before the Mercy-seat of the Christian 
covenant, and the great action of the Eucharist 
is resumed, and the memories of the Upper 
Chamber at Jerusalem are renewed at the altar of 
Westminster. The Word is spoken and the Deed 
is done. A great cloud of prayer and aspiration 
and intercession floats up from the vast concourse 
of assembled worshippers ; and, in the midst of 
them, the crowned and anointed King, kneeling 
by her who must aid him to bear his burden, 
seeks through the Divinely-appointed Medium 
supernatural strength for a more than human 
task. From a full heart and with the solemnest 
intent a united nation says, '^ God save King 
Edward." 



The scene is changed from Westminster Abbey 
to a dining-room in Belgravia, and the date from 
Saturday, 9th August, to Sunday, 3rd. Thirty 
guests, male and female, are gathered round a 
too-bountiful board ; and, amidst the rich fumes of 
mayonnaise and quails and whitebait and cham- 
pagne-cup, there rise the mingled voices of the 
great '' Coronation Chorus." 

Enthusiastic Young Lady. ^' I can think of no- 
thing but the Coronation. Where are you going 
to see it from ?" 



6 SEEING AND HEARING 

Facetious Young Man. ^' Oh ! from Hurlingham. 
That's quite near enough. The whole thing is 
such a frightful bore. You know what they say 
London is just now. All Board and no Lodging." 

New Peeress, ^^ I really envy the duchesses. 
They have such good places in the front row. I 
shall be poked away under the gallery quite at the 
back. I don't believe I shall see a thing. But, 
after all, one will be able to say one has been 
there." 

Facetious Young Man. " Oh ! you could say that 
anyhow. It's not good enough to get up at four 
in the morning for the sake of saying that. 
Charley FitzBattleaxe thinks just the same as I 
do about it, but of course, as he's a peer, he's 
bound to go. He's a bad hand at getting up 
early, so he's going to sit up playing bridge all 
night, and then have his bath and go straight to 
the show." 

Stout Peeress. '' Our creation is rather old, so 
I have got a very good place, but the chairs are 
too dreadful. Such stiff backs, and only nine 
inches to sit on, and horrid wicker seats which 
will make marks on our velvet." 

Thrifty Peeress, ^' Well, I really don't know 
where I shall have my luncheon. It seems mon- 
strous to have to pay two guineas at the House of 
Lords for a sandwich and a glass of claret. The 
Watermans in Dean's Yard have most kindly 
asked me to go to luncheon with them, and it 



THE CORONATION 7 

would be an immense saving. But they are strict 
teetotallers, and I feel that, after all those hours in 
the Abbey, I shall want something more support- 
ing than lemonade. So I am rather divided. I 
dread the idea of a teetotal luncheon, but two 
guineas for a glass of claret and a sandwich is 
rather much." 

Nervous Peeress. ^^ I am so terrified of being 
faint in the Abbey. I am going to take chocolate 
and meat lozenges in my coronet, and some brandy 
and water in my smelling-bottle." 

Chorus (confusedly). '^ Oh no, port wine is the 
thing. No — rum and milk. My doctor says 
whisky. Whisky ? Oh no ; sal volatile is much 
the best, and Plasmon biscuits. Not sandwiches 
— I hate sandwiches. Cold chicken. But can 
we eat in church ? Isn't it rather odd ? Oh, the 
Abbey isn't exactly a church, you know. Isn't 
it ? I should have thought it was. Well — no — 
our Vicar tells me that it was never consecrated. 
How very curious ! At least it was only conse- 
crated by the Angels, not by the Bishop. Well, 
of course that makes a difference. Still, I don't 
like the idea of eating and drinking in it. So I 
shall have some pate de foie gras and champagne 
in the carriage, and eat till the very moment I get 
to the Abbey, and begin again the very moment I 
get out." 

Lively Young Lady. " I'm not afraid of being 
faint — only of being bored in that long wait. I 



8 SEEING AND HEARING 

shall take something to read while mamma is stuff- 
ing herself with her sandwiches." 

Facetious Young Man. ^^ What a good idea ! 
Shall you take Modern Society or the Pink *Un?'^ 

Grave Young Lady (intervening). ^'Neither, I 
hope. People seem to forget that after all it is a 
religious service. If one must read, I think ' John 
Inglesant ' or one of Miss Yonge's books would 
be more suitable than a newspaper." 

Lively Young Lady. '' Well, really, it is so difB- 
cult to think of it as a religious service. It 
seems to me more like a play. I saw one of the 
rehearsals, and certainly it was as funny as a 
pantomime. But still, of course, one wouldn't 
wish to do anything that was unsuitable ; so I 
think I shall take a ^Guide-book to the Abbey' 
and learn all the history while we are waiting. 
One hears so much about it just now, and it 
seems stupid not to know. I never can remember 
whether St. Edward was Edward the Confessor 
or Edward the Sixth. Do you know ? " 

Facetious Young Man. '' Oh, ask me an easier 
one. Those old jossers were all pretty much of 
a muchness. I tell you Tm not taking any. The 
whole thing is utterly out of date. Why couldn't 
he write his name in a book, or send a crier round 
with a bell to say he's come to the throne ? " 

The Host. '' My dear Freddy Du Cane, I don't 
agree with you the least. I am bound to say 
quite honestly that all my life I have hoped that 



THE CORONATION 9 

I might live to see a Coronation, and I am honestly 
thankful that I have got a place. It is all the things 
that interest me most rolled into one — Pageant 
and History and Patriotism and a great Religious 
Ceremony. I am a Liberal ; therefore I like the 
Recognition and the Oath. I am a Ritualist ; 
therefore I like the vestments and the Unction and 
the oblation of the Golden Pall. Above all I am 
an Englishman, and I like to see my Sovereign 
take up the duties of sovereignty at the altar of 
' that Royal and National sanctuary which has for 
so many centuries enshrined the varied memories 
of his august ancestors and the manifold glories 
of his free and famous kingdom.' Those words 
are Dean Stanley's. Do you know his account of 
the Coronation in his * Memorials of Westminster 
Abbey ' ? If you will let me, I will show it to 
you after luncheon. People ought at least to know 
what the service is before they presume to make 
stupid jokes about it." 

Curtain. 



II 

SECRET SOCIETIES 

When Lord Scamperdale was angry with Mr. 
Sponge for riding over his hounds he called him 
^^a perpendicular Puseyite pig-jobber"; and the 
alliteration was felt to emphasize the rebuke. 
If any Home Ruler is irritated by Sir Robert 
Anderson he may relieve his feelings by calling 
him a *^ preaching political policeman/' and each 
word in the title will be true to life. Sir Robert 
combines in his single person the characters of 
barrister^ detective, and theologian. He began life 
at the Irish Bar, was for many years head of the 
Criminal Investigation Department in London, then 
became Assistant Commissioner of Police, and all 
the while gave what leisure he could spare from 
tracking dynamiters and intercepting burglars to 
the composition of such works as ''The Gospel 
and its Ministry," '' A Handbook of Evangelical 
Truth," and '' Daniel in the Critic's Den." 

A career so diversified was sure to produce 
some interesting reminiscences, and the book ^ 

^ "Sidelights on the Home Rule Movement." By Sir Robert 
Anderson, K.C.B., LL.D. 



SECRET SOCIETIES ii 

which Sir Robert has just pubHshed is as full of 
mystery and adventure, violence and strategy, plot 
and counterplot, as the romances which thrilled 
our youth. In those days some boys thought 
soldiering the one life worth living ; some, in fancy, 
ran away to sea. Some loved tales of Piracy, 
and were peculiarly at home in a Smugglers' Cave. 
Others snatched a fearful joy from ghosts and 
bogies. Others enjoyed Brazilian forests and 
African jungles, hand-to-hand encounters with 
gorillas and hair-breadth 'scapes from watchful 
tigers. The present writer thought nothing so 
delightful as Secret Societies, and would have 
given his little all to know a password, a sign, 
or a secret code. Perhaps this idiosyncrasy was 
due to the fact that in the mid 'sixties every 
paper teemed with allusions to Fenianism, just 
then a very active force in the political world ; 
and to Smith Minus, in the Fourth Form at 
Harrow, there was something unspeakably attrac- 
tive in the thought of being a ^* Head Centre," a 
*^ Director," or an " Executive Officer of the Irish 
RepubUcan Brotherhood," or even in the paler 
glory of writing the mystic letters '' F.B." or '' CO." 
after his undistinguished name. It is in his account 
of the earlier days of Fenianism that Sir Robert 
Anderson is so intensely interesting. He traces it, 
from its origin in the abortive rebeUion of 1848 
and that '^ Battle of Limerick " which Thackeray 
sang, to its formal inauguration in i860, and its 



12 SEEING AND HEARING 

subsequent activities at home and abroad ; and 
the narrative begins, quite thrillingly, with the 
biography of the famous spy Henri le Caron, 
who played so striking a part before the Commis- 
sion on Parnellism and Crime. Those who wish 
to learn these incidents in our recent history, or 
as much of them as at present can properly be 
disclosed, must read Sir Robert's book for them- 
selves. I will not attempt even to epitomize it ; 
and, indeed, I only mention it because of the 
^< sidelights " which it throws, not on Home Rule, 
but on the part which Secret Societies have played 
in the fortunes of Modern Europe. 

As far as I know, the only Englishman — if 
Englishman he could properly be called — who re- 
garded the Secret Societies as formidable realities 
was Lord Beaconsfield. As long ago as 1844 — 
long before he had official experience to guide him 
— he wrote, with regard to his favourite Sidonia 
(in drawing whom he drew himself) : — 

^' The catalogue of his acquaintance in the shape 
of Greeks, Armenians, Moors, Secret Jews, Tartars, 
Gipsies, wandering Poles, and Carbonari would 
throw a curious light on those subterranean agencies 
of which the world in general knows so little, but 
which exercise so great an influence on public 
events." 

Those were the days when Disraeli, a genius 
whom no one treated seriously, was uttering his 
inmost thoughts through the medium of romances 



SECRET SOCIETIES 13 

to which fancy contributed at least as much as 
fact. Then came twenty years of constant activity 
in poUtics — that pursuit which, as Bacon says, is 
of all pursuits ^* the most immersed in matter," — 
and, when next he took up the novelist's pen, he 
was a much older and more experienced, though 
he would scarcely be a wiser, man. In 1870 he 
startled the world with " Lothair " ; and those who 
had the hardihood to fight their way through all 
the fashionable flummery with which the book 
begins found in the second and third volumes a 
profoundly interesting contribution to the history 
of Europe between 1848 and 1868. One of the 
characters says that '' the only strong things in 
Europe are the Church and the Secret Societies " ; 
and the book is a vivid narrative of the struggle 
for life and death between the Temporal Power of 
the Papacy and the insurrectionary movements in- 
spired by Garibaldi. Every chapter of the book con- 
tains a portrait, and every incident is drawn from 
somethingwhich had come under the author's notice 
between 1866 and 1869, when he was the leading 
personage in the Tory Government and the Fenians 
were making open and secret war on English rule. 
He was describing the men whom he knew and 
the things which he had seen, and this fact makes 
the book so extraordinarily vivid, and won for it 
Froude's enthusiastic praise. Every one could re- 
cognize Capel and Manning and Antonelli and 
Lord Bute, and all their diplomatic and fashionable 



14 SEEING AND HEARING 

allies ; it required some knowledge of the insurrec- 
tionary movements to see in '' Captain Bruges " a 
portrait of General Cluseret, commander-in-chief 
of every insurgent army in Europe or America, or 
in Theodora the noble character of Jessie White- 
Mario, whose career of romantic devotion to the 
cause of Freedom closed only in this year.^ 

^' Madre Natura " in Italy, Fenianism in America 
and England, the '^Mary Anne" Societies of France, 
and the mysterious alliance between all these 
subterranean forces, are the themes of '^ Lothair," 
and the State trials of the time throw a good deal 
of light upon them all. Even more mysterious, 
much harder to trace, and infinitely more enduring 
were the operations of the Carbonari — beginning 
with a handful of charcoal-burners in the forests 
of Northern Italy, and spreading thence, always 
by woodland ways, to the centre and north of 
Europe. They promoted the French revolutions 
of 1830 and 1848. Even Louis Napoleon^ allied 
himself with them in his earlier machinations 
against Louis Philippe and the Republic ; and in the 
Franco-German War of 1870 they rendered incal- 
culable service to the German troops by guiding 
them through the fastnesses of the Ardennes. It is 
one of the characteristics of the Secret Societies 
that they attack the established order, without, 
apparently, caring much what that order repre- 
sents. Their generals fought against England in 

1 1906. 



SECRET SOCIETIES 15 

Canada and in Ireland ; against the Northern 
States in America ; against Russia in the Danubian 
Principalities. It is not to be supposed that in 
1870 the Carbonari had much sympathy with the 
military absolutism of Prussia ; but Prussia was 
attacking the French Empire, and that was enough 
for the Carbonari. 

Of course, as a general rule, the Secret Societies 
of the Continent were anti-monarchical and anti- 
Christian ; but he who loves these mysterious 
combinations can find plenty to interest him in 
the history of organizations which were neither 
Republican nor Atheistic. Nothing could be 
more devotedly monarchical and orthodox than 
the ^^ Cycle of the White Rose." This Society, 
profoundly ^' secret," was founded about the year 
1727. It had for its object to unite all the 
Cavalier and Nonjuring families of North Wales 
and Cheshire, with a view to concerted action 
when next the exiled Stuarts should claim their 
own. The headquarters were always at Wynnstay, 
and the Lady of Wynnstay was always Patroness. 
The badge was a White Rose in enamel, and the 
list of members was printed in a circle, so that if 
it should fall into the hands of Government no 
one should appear as ringleader or chief. The 
Cycle was for some fifty years a real and definite 
organization for political ends ; but, as years went 
on and the hopes of the Jacobites perished, the 
Cycle degenerated into a mere dining-club, and 



i6 SEEING AND HEARING 

it expired in 1850. Its last member was, I 
believe, the Rev. Sir Theophilus Puleston, who 
lived to see the second Jubilee of Queen Victoria ; 
and the last Lady Patroness died in 1905. 

Another Secret Society which once meant 
practical mischief of no common kind was that 
of the Orangemen. Though Orangemen are 
nowadays vociferously loyal, their forerunners are 
grossly misrepresented if it is not true that, under 
the Grand-mastership of the Duke of Cumberland, 
afterwards King Ernest of Hanover, they organized 
a treasonable conspiracy to prevent Queen Victoria 
from succeeding to the Throne of her ancestors 
and to put her uncle in her place. For sidelights 
on this rather dark passage of modern history the 
curious reader is referred to ^^ Tales of my Father," 
by "A. M. F.," and to a sensational rendering of 
the same story, called '' God Save the Queen." 

My space is failing, and I must forbear to enlarge 
on the most familiar and least terrifying of all 
*' Secret Societies." I hold no brief for the " Grand 
Orient of France," even though Pius IX. may 
once have belonged to this or a similar organiza- 
tion ; but I must profess that English Freemasons 
are the most respectable, most jovial, and most 
benevolent of mankind ; and I trust that they will 
accept in its true intention Cardinal Manning's 
ambiguously worded defence of their craft, 
" English Freemasonry is a Goose Club." 



Ill 

THE IRISH PEERAGE 

Dryasdust is proverbially a borC; and his forms 
are Protean. Thus there are the Jacobite Dryas- 
dusts; who afBrm that Queen Victoria had no 
higher dignity than that of Dowager Princess Albert 
of Saxe-Coburg, and deny that any act of sove- 
reignty transacted in this country has been valid 
since that dark morning when James II., making the 
best of his way to the Old Kent Road, dropped the 
Great Seal into the Thames. Then there are the 
Constitutional Dryasdusts, who deny the existence 
of a Cabinet or a Prime Minister, and insist that 
the Privy Council is the only Ministerial body 
known to the law ; and the Ecclesiastical Dryas- 
dusts, who affirm that the Church of England is 
really free because the bishops are freely elected 
by the Chapters of their respective Cathedrals, 
acting under licence from a Sovereign who, havmg 
been anointed, is a Persona Mixta — part layman, 
part ecclesiastic. At the height of the South 
African War I chanced to meet an Heraldic 
Dryasdust, who moaned like a mandrake over the 

announcement that the Duke of Norfolk had just 

17 B 



1 8 SEEING AND HEARING 

set out, with his Yeomanry, for the scene of action. 
" You mean," I said, ^^ that a valuable life is need- 
lessly imperilled?" ^' Not at all," replied Dryas- 
dust, with a face as long as a fiddle-case. '' A far 
more important consideration than the Duke's life 
is involved. As Earl-Marshal he is supreme com- 
mander of the forces of the Crown when engaged 
in actual warfare, and the moment he sets his foot 
on African soil Lord Roberts becomes subject to 
his command. There is no way out of that con- 
stitutional necessity, and I regard the outlook as 
very serious." And so indeed it would have been, 
had Dryasdust been right. 

I am led to this train of reflections by the fact 
that an eminent genealogist has lately tried to 
frighten the readers of a Sunday paper by broach- 
ing the theory that all the Acts of Parliament passed 
within the last twenty years may have been invalid. 
He does not commit himself to the statement that 
they are invalid, but he insists that they may be, 
and he grounds his contention on a clause of the 
Act of Union. Concerning this clause he says, 
following Sir William Anson, that it requires that 
'' the number of Irish peers, not entitled by the 
possession of other peerages to an hereditary seat 
in the House of Lords of the United Kingdom, 
shall never fall below one hundred." Now it 
seems that during the last twenty years the number 
has fallen below a hundred ; therefore the House 
of Lords has not been properly constituted, and 



THE IRISH PEERAGE 19 

therefore its part in legislation has been null and 
void. It is a startling theory, and like most startling 
theories, will probably turn out to be nonsense ; 
but the history of the Irish Peerage, apart from 
any consequences which may be deduced from it, 
is full of interest, and not wholly free from scandal. 
The Irish peerage, as it stands to-day, comprises 
175 members; of these, 28 sit in the House of 
Lords as Representative Peers, elected for life by 
their brethren ; 82 sit there because they hold 
English as well as Irish peerages ; and the re- 
mainder, being merely Irish peers and not Repre- 
sentatives, do not sit in the House of Lords, but 
are eligible for the House of Commons. In this 
respect their state is more gracious than that of the 
Scotch peers, who cannot be elected to the House 
of Commons, and therefore, unless they can get 
themselves chosen to be Representative Peers of 
Scotland, are excluded from Parliament for ever. 
Still, though a seat in the House of Lords is a 
desirable possession, a mere title has its charms. 

It used to be said that when Mr. Smith the 
banker, who lived in Whitehall, asked George III. 
for the entree of the Horse Guards, the King replied, 
** I can't do that ; but I wish to make you an Irish 
Peer." However, the true version of the story 
seems to be that which is given in the '' Life of the 
Marquis of Granby." 

^Mn 1787 the owner of Rutland House desired 
to increase the private entree into Hyde Park to the 



20 SEEING AND HEARING 

dimensions of a carriage entrance, and asked 
CharleS; fourth Duke of Rutland, to support the 
necessary application to the King. The Duke, 
who was then Viceroy of Ireland, replied, ^ You 
will let me know whether ye appHcation is to be 
made to Lord Orford, who is ye Ranger of ye 
Park, or to ye King himself: in ye latter case I 
would write to Lord Sydney att ye same time ; if 
it be to the King a greater object might be easier 
accomplished than this trifle, as I know he is very 
particular about his Parks ; at least he is so about 
St. James Park, for he made a man an Irish Peer 
to keep him in Good Humour for having refused 
him permission to drive his carriage through ye 
Horse Guards.' " 

Lord Palmerston, himself an Irish peer, used 
to say that an Irish peerage was the most con- 
venient of all dignities, as it secured its owner 
social precedence while it left him free to pursue 
a Parliamentary career. At the same time, greatly 
as he enjoyed his position, Palmerston never would 
take the oaths or comply with the legal formalities 
necessary to entitle him to vote for the Irish Repre- 
sentative Peers ; and the reason for this refusal 
was characteristic alike of an adroit politician and 
of the unscrupulous age in which he lived. An 
Irish peer who has proved his right to vote for the 
Representative Peers, is eligible for election as a 
Representative, and Palmerston feared that his 
political opponents, wishing to get him out of the 



THE IRISH PEERAGE 21 

House of Commons into the comparative obscurity 
and impotence of the House of Lords, would elect 
him a Representative Peer in spite of himself, and 
so effectually terminate his political activities. In 
the days immediately succeeding Palmerston a 
conspicuous ornament of the Irish Peerage was 
the second Marquis of Abercorn. He had no need 
to trouble himself about Representative arrange- 
ments, for he sat in the House of Lords as a 
peer of Great Britain, but his hereditary con- 
nexion with the North of Ireland, his great estates 
there, and the political influence which they gave 
him, made him, in a very real sense, an Irish peer. 
He was Lord-Lieutenant from 1866 to 1868, and 
during his viceroyalty Disraeli (who subsequently 
drew his portrait in ^' Lothair ") conferred upon him 
the rare honour of an Irish dukedom. It was 
rumoured that he wished, in consideration of his 
80,000 acres in Tyrone and Donegal, to become 
the Duke of Ulster, but was reminded that Ulster 
was a Royal title, borne already by the Duke of 
Edinburgh. Be that as it may, he stuck to his 
Scotch title, and became Duke of Abercorn. Down 
to that time the Duke of Leinster had been the 
sole Irish duke, and went by the nickname of 
^^ Ireland's Only." To him, as an old friend, the 
newly created Duke of Abercorn wrote a mock 
apology for having invaded his monopoly ; but 
the Duke of Leinster was equal to the occasion, 
and wrote back that he was quite content to be 



22 SEEING AND HEARING 

henceforward the Premier Duke of Ireland. When, 
six months later, Disraeli was driven out of office, 
he conferred an Irish barony on a faithful sup- 
porter, Colonel M^Clintock, who was made Lord 
Rathdonnell ; and it was generally understood 
that, by arrangement between the leaders on both 
sides, no more Irish peerages were to be created. 
This understanding held good till Mr. George 
Curzon, proceeding to India as Viceroy and con- 
templating a possible return to Parliament when 
his term of ofhce expired, persuaded Lord SaHs- 
bury to make him Lord Curzon of Kedleston in 
the Peerage of Ireland. 

But, after all, the Irish Peerage of to-day is to 
a great extent the product of the Irish Union. 
*' There is no crime recorded in history — I do not 
except the Massacre of St. Bartholomew — which 
will compare for a moment with the means by 
which the Union was carried.'' The student of 
men and moods, having no clue to guide him, 
would probably attribute this outburst to Mr. 
Gladstone at some period between his first and 
second Home Rule Bills ; and he would be right. 
For my own part, I can scarcely follow the allu- 
sion to St. Bartholomew, but beyond doubt the 
measures employed by the English Government 
in order to secure the Union were both cruel and 
base. It is the baseness with which we are just 
now concerned. In order to carry the Union it 
was necessary to persuade the Irish Houses of 



THE IRISH PEERAGE 23 

Lords and Commons, and to capture the whole 
machinery of bribery and terrorism which directed 
the Irish Parliament. As that blameless publicist 
Sir T. Erskine May tranquilly observes, '' corrupt 
interests could only be overcome by corruption." 
The policy of out-corrupting the corruptest was 
pursued with energy and resolution. Each patron 
of Irish boroughs who was ready to part with them 
received ;^75oo for each seat. Lord Downshire 
got ;^5 2,000 for seven seats ; Lord Ely ;6^45,ooo 
for six. The total amount paid in compensa- 
tion for the surrender of electoral powers was 
;^i, 2 60,000. In addition to these pecuniary in- 
ducements, honours were lavishly distributed as 
bribes. Five Irish peers were called to the House 
of Lords, twenty were advanced a vStep in the 
peerage, and twenty-two new peers were created. 
It would be invidious, and perhaps actionable, to 
attach proper names to the amazing histories of 
Corruption by Title which are narrated in the 
Private Correspondence of the Viceroy, Lord 
Cornwallis, and the published Memoirs of Sir 
Jonah Harrington. Even that sound loyaHst Mr. 
Lecky was constrained to admit that ^'the majority 
of Irish titles are historically connected with 
memories not of honour but of shame." On the 
22nd January 1799 one member of the Irish 
House of Commons took his bribe in the brief in- 
terval between his speech for, and his vote against 
a resolution affirming the right of the Irish nation 



24 SEEING AND HEARING 

to an independent Legislature. Another aspirant 
to the peerage <' made and sang songs against the 
Union in 1799, and made and sang songs for it 
in 1800." He got his deserts. A third secured 
;£^3 0,000 for his surrendered boroughs, a peerage 
for himself; and for his brother in Holy Orders an 
archbishopric so wealthy that its fortunate owner 
became a peer, and subsequently an earl, on his 
own account. The scandalous tale might be in- 
definitely prolonged ; but enough has been said 
to show why it is difficult to shed tears when these 
strangely-engendered peerages sink below the 
prescribed number of a hundred. 



IV 

OMITTED SILHOUETTES 

Last year ^ I ventured to submit for public inspec- 
tion a small collection of Social Silhouettes. From 
time to time during the last few months I have 
received several kind enquiries about Omitted Por- 
traits. For instance, there is the Undertaker. 
Perhaps a friend will write : ^' Dickens made 
capital fun out of Mr. Mould and the ' Hollow Elm 
Tree.' Couldn't you try your hand at something 
of the same kind ? " Another writes, perhaps a 
little bluntly : '' Why don't you give us the Bar- 
rister ? He must be an awfully easy type to do." 
A third says, with subtler tact : '^ I feel that, since 
Thackeray left us, yours is the only pen which can 
properly handle the Actor " — or the Painter, or 
the Singer, or the Bellringer, or the Beadle, as the 
case may be. Now, to these enquiries, conceived, 
as I know them all to be, in the friendliest spirit, 
my answer varies a little, according to the type 
suggested. With regard to the Barrister, I stated 
quite early in my series that I did not propose 
to deal with him, because he had been drawn 

^ 1906. 

as 



26 SEEING AND HEARING 

repeatedly by the master-hands of fiction, and 
because the lapse of years had wrought so little 
change in the type that Serjeant Snubbin, and 
Fitz-Roy Timmins, and Sir Thomas Underwood, 
and Mr. Furnival, and Mr. Chaffanbrass were por- 
traits which needed no retouching. I must, indeed, 
admit that the growth of hair upon the chin and 
upper lip is a marked departure from type, and 
that a moustached K.C. is as abnormal a being as 
a bearded woman or a three-headed nightingale ; 
but the variation is purely external, and the true 
inwardness of the Barrister remains what it was 
when Dickens and Thackeray and Trollope drew 
him. So, again, with regard to the Family Soli- 
citor ; as long as men can study the methods of 
Mr. Tulkinghorn (of Lincoln's Inn Fields) and 
Mr. Putney Giles (of the same learned quarter) 
they may leave Mr. Jerome K. Jerome in undis- 
turbed possession of his stage-lawyer, who '' dresses 
in the costume of the last generation but seven, 
never has any office of his own, and (with the aid 
of a crimson bag) transacts all his business at his 
cUents' houses." 

When I am asked why I do not describe the 
Painter, my reply is partly the same. We have 
got Gaston Phoebus, and Olive Newcome, and 
Claude Mellot, and the goodly company of Trilby, 
and we shall not easily improve upon those por- 
traits, whether highly finished or merely sketched. 
But in this case I have another reason for reticence. 



OMITTED SILHOUETTES 27 

I know a good many painters, who about this time 
of year bid me to their studios. I have experienced 
before now the deHcate irritability of the artistic 
genius, and I know that a reverential reticence is 
my safest course. Conversely, my reason for not 
describing the Actor is that I really do not know 
him well enough. An actor off the stage is about 
as exhilarating an object as a theatre by daylight. 
The brilliancy and the glamour have departed ; 
the savour of sawdust and orange-peel remains. 
Let us render all honour to the histrion when his 
foot is on his native boards ; but if we are wise 
we shall eschew in private life the society of Mr. 
and Mrs. Vincent Crummies, nor open our door too 
widely to the tribe of Costigan and Fotheringay. 

The mention of that great actress's name (for 
did not Emily Costigan, afterwards Lady Mirabel, 
figure as ^' Miss Fotheringay " on the provincial 
stage ?) reminds me that, according to some of 
my critics, women played too rare and too 
secluded a part in my series of *' Typical Develop- 
ments." It is only too true, and no one knows 
as well as the author the amount of brilliancy and 
interest which has been forfeited thereby. But 
really it is a sacred awe that has made me mute. 
Even to-day, as I write, I am smarting under a 
rebuke recently administered to me, at a public 
gathering, by an outraged matron. This lady 
belongs to the political section of her tribe ; 
holds man, poor man ! in proper contempt ; and 



28 SEEING AND HEARING 

clamours on Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman's 
doorstep for that suffrage which is to make her 
truly free. At present she esteems herself little 
better than a Squaw, and has been heard to 
declare, in moments of expansive eloquence, that 
she was not created to be the Toy of Man — a 
declaration in which her hearers most heartily 
concurred. Well, this stern guardian of her sex's 
rights recently took me to task in a public place 
for the levity with which I had criticized a gather- 
ing of political ladies, and my nerve has scarcely 
rallied from the sudden onslaught. Had I been 
more myself I might even yet have tried my un- 
skilled hand at female portraiture. Perhaps, in 
the spirit of that Cambridge professor who calls 
William II. '^ quite the nicest Emperor I know," I 
might have begun in the most illustrious circles, 
and have sketched the stone-laying and bazaar- 
opening activities of Royal Princesses. Or, yield- 
ing precedence to the Church, I might have 
discoursed of Episcopal ladies and have traced 
the influence of a tradition received from the 
beatified Mrs. Proudie. ^* We had a very nice 
Ordination this Trinity," says one lady of this 
class. ^' The Bishop and I were much disap- 
pointed by the poor response of the laity to our 
appeal," wrote another. When in May 1899 
the Archbishops were playing at a Court for the 
trial of Ritualism, Episcopal ladies sate knitting 
by the judgment-seat, and stared at the incrimi- 



OMITTED SILHOUETTES 29 

nated clergymen; as the tricoteuses of the French 
Revolution may have stared at the victims of the 
guillotine, or as Miss Squeers peered through the 
keyhole at the flagellation of Smike. Or again, 
on a lowlier rung of the Ecclesiastical ladder, I 
might have drawn the Parochial Worker — the 
woman of waterproof and gingham, the distributor 
of tracts, the discipHnarian of the Sunday School, 
the presiding spirit of Mothers' Meetings. At a 
General Election this type of lady varies her 
activities — canvasses for the Conservative candi- 
date, and tells the gaping washerwomen that 
Mr. Lloyd-George wishes to convert the Welsh 
cathedrals into music-halls for the Eisteddfod. 
Of all Parochial Workers the highest type is the 
Deaconess ; and not long ago, in a parish with 
which I am conversant, the Deaconess and the 
Curate used to do their parochial rounds on a 
double bicycle, to the infinite amusement of the 
gutter-children and the serious perturbation of the 
severely orthodox. There was a picture worthy 
of the pen and pencil of Thackeray, but it faded 
all too soon into the blurred commonplace of 
matrimony. 

The Deaconess may be called the Marine of 
the Church's army, with one foot on sea and one 
on shore — only half a Worldling, yet not quite a 
Nun. With ladies of the last-named type, my 
acquaintance has been prolonged and intimate. 
Of their excellence and devotion it would be im- 



30 SEEING AND HEARING 

pertinent to speak ; but I may say without offence 
that some of the ablest, most agreeable, and most 
amusing women I have known I have encountered 
in the Cloister. But, alas ! even into the Cloister 
the serpent of political guile will wend his sinuous 
way ; nor could I, though her friend, commend 

the action of Sister G M when, in order 

to prevent a patient in a Convalescent Home from 
voting for a Radical candidate, she kept his trousers 
under lock and key till the poll was over. 

'^ Old age," it has been bitterly said, '^ when it 
can no longer set a bad example, gives good 
advice ; " and when, as sometimes happens, I am 
asked to hortate my younger fellow-citizens, one of 
my most emphatic lessons is a Reverence for 
Womanhood, even in its least ideal aspects. This, 
I declare to be an essential attribute of the ideal 
character — of that manhood, at once beautiful 
and good, to which the philosophers have taught 
us to aspire ; and, lest I should seem to be vio- 
lating my own oft-repeated precept, I tear myself 
from a fascinating theme. 



V 

DOCTORS AND DOCTORING 

Sydney Smith, who was fond of quacking his 
parishioners, and had a poor opinion of '' pro- 
fessional and graduated homicides/' observes that 
" the Sixth Commandment is suspended by one 
medical diploma from the North of England to 
the South." Personally, I have experienced the 
attentions of the Faculty north, south, east, and 
west, and I began in London. In my first appear- 
ance on this planet I was personally conducted 
by a smart gentleman, who came straight from a 
dinner-party, in a large white cravat and turquoise 
studs. Those studs still exist, and have descended, 
with the practice, to his grandson. May they 
beam on births more propitious than my own. 

My knowledge of the first act of life's drama 
is necessarily traditional. But, as I approach the 
second, memory begins to operate. I seem to re- 
member a black silhouette of a gentleman in an 
elbow-chair, with a pigtail and knee-breeches ; 
and this icon was revered as the likeness of '^ old 
Doctor P ." This '' old Dr. P.'s " son, '' Tom 

P ," was a sturdy stripling of seventy odd, 

31 



32 SEEING AND HEARING 

who had never used a stethoscope, and dismissed 
a rival practitioner who talked about heart-sounds 
as ^* an alarmist. " To these succeeded a third 
generation of the same drug-stained dynasty, repre- 
sented to me by a gentleman in shiny black, who 
produced a large gold watch when he felt one's 
pulse, and said ^^ Hah ! " when he looked at one's 
tongue. These three generations, for something 
more than a century, monopolized all the best 
practice of Loamshire, were immensely respected, 
and accumulated a great deal of money. Echoes 
of the dialogue between doctor and patient still 
haunt the ear of memory : — 

Nervous and Dyspeptic Lady. " Do you know, Dr. 
P., I felt so very uncomfortable after luncheon — 
quite a sensation of sinking through the floor. 
Of course I had some brandy and water — about 
half and half — at once, but I feel that I ought to 
have a little champagne at dinner. Nothing helps 
me so much." 

Dr. P. ^' Your ladyship is no inconsiderable 
physician. I was about to make the same sugges- 
tion. But pray be careful that it is a dry wine." 

All this was very comfortable and friendly, and 
tended to promote the best relations between 
doctor and patient. I do not recollect that the 
doctor was supposed to effect cures ; but his 
presence at a deathbed created the pleasant sense 
that all had been done which could be done, and 
that the patient was dying with the dignity proper 



DOCTORS AND DOCTORING 33 

to his station. It may be remarked, in passing, 
that the two elder generations did all their rounds, 
early and late, summer and winter, on horseback ; 
while the third subsided into a brougham drawn 
by a pair of horses afflicted with stringhalt, and 
presumably bought cheap on account of that 
infirmity. 

So much for the men. What was their method ? 
To my infant palate the oils of castor and cod 
were as familiar as mother's milk. I dwelt in a 
land flowing with rhubarb and magnesia. The 
lively leech was a household pet. '' Two nocturnes 
in blue and an arrangement in black," as the 
^Esthete said, were of frequent occurrence. But 
other parts of the system were more palatable. I 
seem to have drunk beer from my earliest infancy. 
A glass of port wine at eleven, with a teaspoonful 
of bark in it, was the recognized tonic, and brandy 
(which the doctor, who loved periphrasis, always 
called <' the domestic stimulant ") was administered 
whenever one looked squeamish, while mulled 
claret was '' exhibited " as a soporific. The notion 
of pouring all this stuff down a child's throat 
sounds odd to a generation reared on Apollinaris 
and barley-water, but it had this one advantage — 
that when one grew up it was impossible to make 
one drunk. 

From childhood we pass on to schooldays. 
Wild horses should not drag from me the name 
of the seminary where I was educated, for its 

c 



34 SEEING AND HEARING 

medical arrangements left a good deal to be desired. 
There were three doctors in this place, and they 
shared the care of some six hundred boys. Dr. A. 
was certainly very old, and was reputed to be very 
good; insomuch that his admirers said that, if they 
were dying, they should wish to have Dr. A. with 
them, as he was better than any clergyman. If, 
however, they were so carnally-minded as to wish 
to recover, they sent for Dr. B., a bluff gentleman, 
who told his patients that they were not half as ill 
as they thought, and must pull themselves together 
— a prescription which, if there was nothing the 
matter, answered admirably. The third was a 
grievous gentleman, who took a dark view of life, 
and, sitting by my sick-bed, would inform me of 
the precarious condition of a schoolfellow, who, to 
use his own phrase, was ^^ slipping through his 
fingers," and ^' had no more constitution than a 
fly." Regarding this triumvirate in the light of 
my subsequent experience, I cannot affect surprise 
that there were fifteen deaths among the boys 
during the five years that I was in the school. 

From the anonymous school I proceeded to an 
anonymous university, where the medical world 
was dominated by the bland majesty of Sir Omicron 
Pie (the name is TroUope's, but it will serve). Who 
that ever saw them can forget that stately bearing, 
that Jove-like brow, that sublime air of omniscience 
and omnipotence ? Who that ever heard it, that 
even flow of mellifluous eloquence and copious 



DOCTORS AND DOCTORING 35 

narrative ? Who that ever experienced it, the 
underlying kindness of heart ? 

A nervous undergraduate is ushered into the 
consulting-room^ and the great man advances 
with a paternal smile. 

^' Mr. Bumpstead ? Ah ! I think I was at school 
with your good father. No ? Then it must have 
been your uncle. You are very like him. We 
ran a neck-and-neck race at the University. I 
won the Gold Medal, and he was proxime. In 
those days I little thought of settling down in 
Oxbridge. I had destined myself for a London 
practice ; but Sir Thomas Watson — you have 
heard of ' Watson's style ' ? He was the Cicero 
of Medicine — well, Watson said, ' No, my dear 
Pie, it won't do. In ten years you will be at 
the head of the profession, and will have made 
^100,000. But, mark my words, the blade will 
wear out the scabbard. You are not justified in 
risking your life.' I was disappointed, of course. 
All young men like the idea of fame. But I saw 
that Watson was right, and I came here, and found 
my life's work. The Medical School was then in 
a very decayed condition, and I have made it what 
it is. Why am I telling you all this ? " 

{Enter the butler,) ^' Please, Sir Omicron, you've 
an appointment at Battle-axe Castle at four o'clock, 
and the carriage is at the door." 

Sir O. P, '' Ah ! well. I must tell you the 
rest another day. Let me see, what was the 



36 SEEING AND HEARING 

matter ? Palpitation ? Let me listen for a moment. 
It is as I thought — only a little functional irrita- 
bility. Lead a sensible life ; avoid excess ; cultivate 
the philosophic temper. Take this prescription, 
and come again next week. Thank you, thank 
you." 

Fortified by four years of Sir Omicron's care, I 
came up to London somewhere between 1870 and 
1880. The practice of the West End was then 
divided between three men — Sir A. B., Sir C. D., 
and Sir E. F. 

Sir A. B. was bluff and brutal, fashioned himself 
on the traditions of Abernethy, and ruled his patients 
by sheer terrorism. He had an immense influence 
over hysterical women and weak-minded men, and 
people who might otherwise have resented his 
ursine manner were reconciled to it by the know- 
ledge that he officially inspected the most illustrious 
Tongue in the kingdom. 

His principal rival was Sir C. D., who ruled by 
love. '^ Well, my dear sir, there is not much the 
matter. A day or two's hunting will set you right. 
You don't ride ? Ah ! well, it doesn't much matter. 
A fortnight at Monte Carlo will do just as well. 
All you want is change of scene and plenty of 
amusement." 

^^ As to your ladyship's diet, it should be light 
and nutritious. I should recommend you to avoid 
beafsteaks and boiled mutton. A little turtle soup, 
some devilled whitebait, and a slice of a turkey 



DOCTORS AND DOCTORING 37 

truffe would be the sort of dinner to suit you. If 
the insomnia is at all urgent, I have found a light 
supper of pate de foie gras work wonders." 

Sir E. F. operated on a theological system. 
His discourse on the Relations between Natural 
and Revealed Religion profoundly impressed those 
who heard it for the first time, and his tractate 
on Medical Missions in India ran into a third 
edition. In his waiting-room one found, instead 
of last month's Punch or the Christmas number 
of Madanuy devotional works inscribed ^' From his 
grateful patient, the author." In his consulting- 
room a sacred picture of large dimensions crowned 
the mantelpiece, and signed portraits of bishops 
whom he had delivered from dyspepsia adorned 
the walls. Ritualistic clergy frequented him in 
great numbers, and — what was better still — re- 
commended their congregations to the *^ beloved 
physician." Ecclesiastically-minded laymen de- 
lighted in him, and came away with a comfortable 
conviction, syllogistically arranged, that (1) one's 
first duty is to maintain one's health ; (2) whatever 
one likes is healthy ; therefore (3) one's first duty 
is to like exactly as one likes. 

A water-drinking adherent of Mr. Gladstone once 
saw that eminent man crowning a banquet of 
champagne with a glass of undeniable port. '^ Oh ! 
Mr. Gladstone," he exclaimed in the bitterness of 
his soul, '''■ what would Sir E. F. say if he could 
see you mixing your liquors ? " The great man's 



38 SEEING AND HEARING 

defence was ready to his hand : ^' Sir E. F. assures 
me that, if I let fifteen minutes elapse between two 
kinds of wine, there is no mixture." 

Somehow these lively oracles of Sir E. F.'s, with 
which I was always coming in contact, left on my 
mind a dim impression that he must have been 
related to the doctor who attended Little Nell and 
prescribed the remedies which the landlady had 
already applied : ^' Everybody said he was a very 
shrewd doctor indeed, and knew perfectly well 
what people's constitutions were, which there 
appears some reason to suppose he did." 



VI 

MOURNING 

My infant mind was " suckled in a creed outworn/' 
in the form of a book called, by a strange mis- 
nomer, a '* Book of Useful Knowledge." It was 
there stated, if my memory serves me, that ^' the 
Chinese mourn in yellow, but Kings and Cardinals 
mourn in purple." In what do modern English 
people mourn ? That is the subject of to-day's 
enquiry. 

Lord Acton, in one of his most impressive pas- 
sages, speaks of England as living under " insti- 
tutions which incorporate tradition and prolong 
the reign of the dead." But the very notion of 
" prolonging the reign of the dead " is an ana- 
chronism in an age which forgets its friends the 
moment it has buried them. ** Out of sight, out of 
mind" is an adage which nowadays verifies itself 
with startling rapidity. Mourning is as much out 
of date as Suttee ; and, as to the Widow's Cap, the 
admirable Signora Vesey Neroni in ^' Barchester 
Towers " was only a little in advance of her age 
when she exclaimed, ^' The death of twenty hus- 
bands should not make me undergo such a penance. 

39 



40 SEEING AND HEARING 

It is as much a relic of paganism as the sacrifice 
of a Hindoo woman at the burning of her husband's 
body. If not so bloody, it is quite as barbarous 
and quite as useless." 

In days gone by, a death in a family extinguished 
all festivity. Engagements were cancelled, social 
plans were laid aside, and the mourners went 
into retreat for a twelvemonth. Men wore black 
trousers; women swathed themselves in black crape. 
" Mourning Jewellery " — hideous combinations of 
jet and bogwood — twinkled and jingled round the 
necks of the bereaved, and widows wrote on letter- 
paper which was virtually black, with a small white 
space in the middle of the sheet. Harry Foker, 
we know, honoured his father's memory by having 
his brougham painted black ; and I have known 
a lady who, when she lost her husband, had her 
boudoir lined with black velvet, after the fashion 
of Lord Glenallan in '< The Antiquary." 

But nowadays people shrink (with amiable con- 
siderateness) from thus inflicting their griefs on 
their friends ; and if (as we must in charity assume) 
they feel emotion, they studiously conceal it in 
their own bosoms. The ball follows the funeral 
with a celerity and a frank joyousness which suggest 
a Wake ; and the keen pursuers of pleasure protest, 
with quite a religious air, that for their own part 
they would think it absolutely wicked to sorrow 
as those without hope. Weedless widows, be- 
comingly '^gowned," as Ladies' Papers say, in 



MOURNING 41 

pale grey or black and white, sacrifice to propriety 
by forswearing the Opera or the Racecourse for 
twelve months or so, but find a little fresh air on 
the River or at Hurlingham absolutely necessary 
for health ; and, if they dine out quietly or even 
give a little dance at home, are careful to protest 
that they have lost all pleasure in life, but must 
struggle to keep up for the sake of the dear children. 
Surely, as Master Shallow says, ^' good phrases are, 
and ever were, very commendable." The old- 
fashioned manifestations of mourning were no 
doubt overdone, but the modern disregard of the 
dead seems to me both heartless and indecent. 

The supreme exemplar of Mourning was, of 
course, Queen Victoria. During her reign, and in 
her personal practice, the custom of Mourning 
reached its highest point of persistence and solem- 
nity. In 1844 Lady Lyttelton, who was governess 
to the present King and his sister the Princess 
Royal, wrote from Court, " We are such a ' bound- 
less contiguity of shade ' just now." The imme- 
diate cause of that shade was the death ofi Prince 
Albert's father ; and although in Queen Victoria's 
life there was a fair allowance of sunshine, still, 
as Ecclesiastes said, '^the clouds return after the 
rain '" ; and, in a family where cousinship is recog- 
nized to the third and fourth generation, the 
^' shade " of mourning must constantly recur. The 
late Duke of Beaufort, head of the most numerous 
family in the Peerage, always wore a black band 



42 SEEING AND HEARING 

round his white hat, because, as he said, one of 
his cousins was always dead and he would not be 
wanting in respect for the deceased ; and, similarly, 
a Maid of Honour once said to me, ^' I never see 
the Queen's jewels, because she is almost always 
in mourning for some German prince or prin- 
cess, and then she only wears black ornaments." 
Of course, in a case where there was this natu- 
ral predisposition to mournful observance, the 
supreme loss of a husband meant a final renun- 
ciation of the world and its gaieties. I suppose 
it is no exaggeration to say that from her bereave- 
ment in 1 86 1 to her death in 1901 Queen Victoria 
lived in unbroken communion with the unseen 
but unforgotten. The necessary business of the 
State was not, even for a week, laid aside ; but 
pomps and ceremonies and public appearances 
are profoundly distasteful to shattered nerves and 
broken hearts. Yielding to the urgent advice of 
her Ministers, Queen Victoria emerged from four 
years' seclusion to open the new Parliament in 
1866 ; and her reward was reaped in the following 
December, when a peculiarly rancorous politician 
rebuked her at a great meeting of reformers in St. 
James's Hall for a lack of popular sympathies. It 
was then that, on the spur of the moment, John 
Bright, who himself had known so well what 
bereavement meant, uttered his chivalrous defence 
of the absent and lonely Sovereign : — 

'* I am not accustomed to stand up in defence 



MOURNING 43 

of those who are possessors of crowns. But I 
could not sit and hear that observation without a 
sensation of wonder and of pain. I think there 
has been, by many persons, a great injustice done 
to the Queen in reference to her desolate and 
widowed position. And I venture to say this — 
that a woman, be she the Queen of a great realm 
or be she the wife of one of your labouring men, 
who can keep alive in her heart a great sorrow for 
the lost object of her life and affection, is not at 
all likely to be wanting in a great and generous 
sympathy with you." 

Admirable and reverend as was this abiding 
sorrow, contemporary observers felt that its out- 
ward manifestations were not always harmonious. 
The Mausoleum at Frogmore is not a ** poem in 
stone/' and the Monument of Gilt opposite the 
Albert Hall has supplied the frivolous with an 
appropriate pun. Landseer, who, when once he 
forsook his stags and deerhounds, was surely the 
most debased painter of a hideous age, attained 
his worst in a picture of the Slopes at Windsor 
area 1862. Under an inky sky, in the forefront of 
a sunless landscape, stands a black pony, and on 
its back is a lady dressed in the deepest weeds, 
with a black riding-skirt and a black bonnet. A 
retainer in subfusc kilt holds the pony's head, a 
dingy terrier looks on with melancholy eyes, and, in 
the distant background, two darkly-clad princesses 
shiver on a garden-seat. The only spot of colour 



44 SEEING AND HEARING 

in the scene is a red despatch-box, and the whole 
forms the highest tribute of EngHsh art to a 
national disaster and a Queenly sorrow. 

Black, and intensely black, were all the trap- 
pings of courtly woe — black crape, black gloves, 
black feathers, black jewellery. The State-robes 
were worn no longer ; the State-coach stood un- 
used in the coach-house. The footmen wore black 
bands round their arms. It was only by slow 
degrees, and on occasions of high and rare solem- 
nity, that white lace and modest plumes and 
diamonds and decorations were permitted to en- 
liven the firmament of courtly woe. But we of 
the twentieth century live in an age of aesthetic 
revival, and, though perhaps we do not mourn 
so heartily, we certainly mourn more prettily. 
One lady at least there is who knows how to com- 
bine the sincerity of sorrow with its becoming 
manifestation ; and Queen Alexandra in mourning 
garb is as delightful a vision as was Queen Alexandra 
in her clothing of wrought gold, when she knelt 
before the altar of Westminster Abbey and bowed 
her head to receive her diamond crown. 

Queen Victoria's devotion to the memory of 
those whom she had lost had one definite con- 
sequence which probably she little contemplated. 
The annual service, conducted in the Royal Mau- 
soleum at Frogmore on the anniversary of the 
Prince Consort's death, accustomed English people 
to the idea, which since the Reformation had 



MOURNING 45 

become strangely unfamiliar, of devotional com- 
memoration of the Departed. To the Queen's 
religious instincts, deeply tinged as they had been 
by Prince Albert's Lutheranism, such commemo- 
rations were entirely natural ; for German Protes- 
tantism has always cherished a much livelier sense 
of the relation between the living and the de- 
parted than was realized by English Puritanism. 
The example set in high quarters quickly spread. 
Memorial Services became an established form 
of English mourning. Beginning with simple 
prayers and hymns, they gradually developed into 
Memorial Eucharists. The splendid, wailing 
music of the Dies Irce was felt to be the Christian 
echo of the Dominey Refugium; and the common 
instinct of mourning humanity found its appro- 
priate expression when, over the coffin of Prince 
Henry of Battenberg, the choir of St. George's 
Chapel sang the Russian hymn of supplication, 
^^Give rest, O Christ, to Thy servant with Thy 
Saints." 



VII 

WILLS 

If there is any one still left who knows his 
^^ Christian Year," he will remember that Keble ex- 
tolled '^a sober standard of feeling" as a special 
virtue of the English Prayer-book. I have always 
thought that this *' sober standard " is peculiarly 
well exemplified by the rubric about Will-making 
in the Order for the Visitation of the Sick : '' If the 
sick person hath not before disposed of his goods, 
let him then be admonished to make his Will and 
to declare his Debts, what he oweth and what is 
owing unto him, for the better discharging of his 
conscience and the quietness of his Executors. But 
men should often be put in remembrance to take 
order for the settling of their temporal estates whilst 
they are in health." There is something in these 
directions which is curiously English and common- 
place and unrhapsodical, and therefore exactly 
congruous with the temper of a people who have 
never set a high value on unpractical religions. 
To this general duty of Will-making there may, of 
course, be exceptions. Thus Dr. Pusey in his old 
age, when his family was reduced to one and he 



WILLS 47 

had no possessions left except his books, said : 
" In a case like mine, the Law is the best will- 
maker." A pietistic admirer, who had caught the 
words imperfectly, in relating them substituted 
'^ Lord " for ^' Law " ; but the substitution did not 
really affect the sense. In cases where no great 
interests are involved and the requirements of 
justice are not altogether clear, we can wisely 
leave the eventual fate of our possessions to ^^ God's 
scheme for governing the Universe, by men mis- 
called Chance." 

There is, I believe, a certain school of economic 
reformers who would wholly abolish the pre- 
rogative of Will-making, and would decree that 
whatever a man leaves behind him should pass 
automatically to his children, or, failing them, to 
the State. On the social and fiscal results of such 
a system I forbear to speculate ; but, as a sincere 
friend to Literature in all its branches, I would 
ask, if that were law, what would become of the 
Novelists and the Playwrights ? The law of Stage- 
land has been codified for us by the laborious care 
of Mr. Jerome K. Jerome, and among its best- 
established principles seem to be these : If a man 
dies without leaving a will, then all his property 
goes to the nearest villain ; but, if a man dies and 
leaves a will, then all his property goes to whoever 
can get possession of that will. Here are the raw 
materials of dramatic litigation enough to hold the 
Stage for a century ; and ill would it fare with the 



48 SEEING AND HEARING 

embarrassed playwright if a mechanical process of 
law were substituted for the strange possibilities of 
Will-making, with its startling caprices, its incal- 
culable miscarriages, and its eventual triumph of 
injured innocence. Then again, as to Fiction. 
Foul fall the day when our fiction-writers shall be 
unable to traffic any longer in testamentary mysti- 
fication. How would their predecessors have fared 
if they had laboured under such a disability ? I 
am by nature too cautious to ^^ intromit with " the 
mysteries of Scotch law, and in the romances of 
the beloved Sir Walter the complications of Entail 
and of Will-making are curiously intertwined. 
Certainly it was under the provisions of an entail 
that Harry Bertram recovered the estates of Ellan- 
gowan, and I am inclined to think that it was an 
Entail which prompted the Countess of Glenallan 
to her hideous crime ; but it was by will that Miss 
Margaret Bertram devised the lands of Singleside, 
and it was under old Sir Hildebrand's will that 
Francis Osbaldistone succeeded to Osbaldistone 
Hall. 

Even greater are the obligations of our English 
novelists to the testamentary law. Miss Edge- 
worth made admirable use of it in *'^ Almeria." 
Had Englishmen no power of making wills, the 
*' wicked Lord Hertford" could not have executed 
the notorious instrument which gave such un- 
bounded delight to the scandalmongers of 1842— 
1843, and then Lord Beaconsfield could not have 



WILLS 49 

drawn his Hogarth-like picture of the reading of 
Lord Monmouth's will in '' Coningsby." Thacke- 
ray did not traffic very much in wills, though, to 
be sure, Jos Sedley left ;^iooo to Becky Sharp, 
and the opportune discovery of Lord Ringwood's 
will in the pocket of his travelling-carriage simpli- 
fied Philip's career. The insolvent swindler Dr. 
Firmin, who had robbed his son and absconded 
to America, left his will ^' in the tortoiseshell secre- 
taire in the consulting-room, under the picture of 
Abraham offering up Isaac." Dickens was a great 
Will-maker. We know that if Dick Swiveller had 
been a steadier youth he would have inherited 
more than ;^i5o a year from his aunt Rebecca. 
That loyal-hearted lover Mr. Barkis, in spite of 
all rebuffs, made the obdurate Peggotty his resi- 
duary legatee. Mr. Pinching left " a beautiful 
will," and Madeline Bray was the subject of a 
very complicated one. Mr. Dorrit's unexpected 
fortune accrued to him, I think, as Heir-at-law ; 
but the litigation in Jarndyce v. Jarndyce arose, 
as all the world knows, out of a disputed will ; 
and the Thellusson Will Case, on which Dickens 
relied, in later years supplied Henry Kingsley 
with the plot of " Reginald Hetherege." Per- 
haps Dickens's best piece of Will-making is given 
in the case of Mr. Spenlow, who, being a prac- 
titioner in Doctors' Commons, spoke about his 
own will with ^' a serenity, a tranquillity, a 
calm sunset air" which quite affected David 

D 



50 SEEING AND HEARING 

Copperfield ; and then shattered all poor David's 
hopes by dying intestate. 

Anthony Trollope made good use of a Will 
and a Codicil in the plot of "Orley Farm." 
George Eliot, whose disagreeable characters always 
seem a good deal nearer life than her heroes 
and heroines, made Mr. Casaubon behave very 
characteristically in the odious will by which he 
tried to prevent Dorothea from marrying Will 
Ladislaw ; and her picture of the disappoint- 
ment which fell upon the company when Peter 
Featherstone's will was read is perhaps her best 
achievement in the way of humour. ^* Nobody 
present had a farthing ; but Mr. Trumbull had 
the gold-headed cane/' which, considered as an 
acknowledgment of his professional services to 
the deceased, he was ungrateful enough to call 
*' farcical." 

The Law of Settlement and Entail is no part of 
our present study ; but it may be remarked in 
passing that the legal Opinion on the Base Fee by 
which Harold Transome in <' Felix Holt " held the 
Transome Estates was written, at George Eliot's 
request, by a young Chancery Barrister, who 
still survives, a brilliant figure in the world of 
Letters. 

This is enough, and perhaps more than enough, 
about Wills in fiction ; but Wills in real life are 
fully as interesting. The late Sir Charles Butt, 
who presided over the Divorce Court and the 



WILLS 51 

Probate Court, once told me that, though the 
aspect of human nature which is exhibited in 
Divorce is not ideally beautiful, it is far less re- 
pulsive than that which is disclosed by Probate. 
None of the stories which one has read about 
forged wills, forced wills, wills made under pres- 
sure, wills made under misrepresentation, are too 
strange to be true. A century ago the daughter 
of a great landowner in the North of England 
succeeded to his wealth under circumstances 
which, to put it mildly, caused surprise. In later 
life she had a public quarrel with a high-born 
but intemperate dame, who concluded the col- 
loquy by observing, with mordant emphasis, 
^^Well, at any rate I didn't hold my dying 
father's hand to make him sign a will he never 
saw, and then murder the Butler to prevent his 
telling." ^^Ouida," or Miss Braddon, or some 
other novelist of High Life might, I think, make 
something of this scene. 

Spiteful Wills — wills which, by rehearsing and 
revoking previous bequests, mortify the survivors 
when the testator is no longer in a position to do 
so viva voce — form a very curious branch of the 
subject. Lord Kew was a very wealthy peer of 
strict principles and peculiarly acrid temper, and, 
having no wife or children to annoy, he ''took it 
out," as the saying is, of his brothers, nephews, 
and other expectant kinsfolk. One gem from his 
collection I recall, in some such words as these : 



52 SEEING AND HEARING 

** By a previous will I had left ^50,000 to my 
brother John ; but, as he has sent his son to Oxford 
instead of Cambridge, contrary to my expressed 
wish, I reduce the legacy to ;^5oo." May the 
earth lie light on that benevolent old despot ! 
Eccentricities of bequest, again, might make a 
pleasant chapter. The present writer, though not 
yet in tottering age, can recall an annuitant whose 
claim to ;^20 a year was founded (in part) on the 
skill with which he had tied his master's pigtail, 
and that master died in 1830. The proverbial 
longevity of annuitants was illustrated in the case 
of a grey parrot, for whose maintenance his de- 
parted mistress left ;£io a year. The bird was not 
very young when the annuity began to accrue ; 
and, as years went on and friends dropped off, he 
began to feel the loneliness of his lot. With a 
tenderness of heart which did them infinite credit, 
the good couple to whose care the bird had 
been left imported a companion exactly like 
himself to cheer his solitude. Before long one 
of the parrots died, and the mourners re- 
marked that these younger birds had not half 
the constitution of the older generation. So, as 
long as they lived, the parrot lived, and the 
pension lived also. 

Let my closing word on Wills bear the authority 
of a great name. To a retailer of news who 
informed him that Lord Omnium, recently de- 



WILLS 53 

ceased, had left a large sum of money to 
charities, Mr. Gladstone replied with char- 
acteristic emphasis : ^' Thank him for nothing ! 
He was obliged to leave it. He couldn't carry 
it with him." 



VIII 

PENSIONS 

'^ There is no living in this country under twenty 
thousand a year — not that that suffices, but it en- 
titles one to ask a pension for two or three lives." 
This was the verdict of Horace Walpole, who, as 
Sir George Trevelyan antithetically says, '* lived in 
the country and on the country during more than 
half a century, doing for the country less than 
half a day's work in half a year." Talleyrand 
said that no one could conceive how enjoyable a 
thing existence was capable of being who had not 
belonged to the Ancienne Noblesse of France before 
the Revolution ; but really the younger son of an 
important Minister, General, Courtier, or Prelate 
under our English Georges had a good deal to be 
thankful for. It is pleasant to note the innocent 
candour with which, in Walpole's manly declara- 
tion, one enormity is made to justify another. A 
father who held great office in Church or State or 
Law gave, as a matter of course, all his most desir- 
able preferments to his sons. These preferments 
enabled the sons to live in opulence at the public 
charge, their duties being performed by deputy. 

S4 



PENSIONS 55 

The Clerk of the Rolls and the Clerk of the 
Hanaper had no personal contact with the mys- 
terious articles to which they are attached. The 
Clerk of the Irons, the Surveyor of the Meltings, 
and the Accountant of Slops lived far remote 
from such ^^ low-thoughted cares." The writer of 
this book deduces his insignificant being from a 
gentleman who divided with a brother the lucra- 
tive sinecure of Scavenger of Dublin, though 
neither ever set foot in that fragrant city. A 
nephew of Lord-Chancellor Thurlow (who sur- 
vived till 1874) drew pensions for abolished offices 
to the amount of ^^ 11,000 a year; and a son of 
Archbishop Moore was Principal Registrar of the 
Prerogative Court of Canterbury from his boy- 
hood till the abolition of his Court in 1858, when 
he was pensioned off with ^^ 10,000 a year. 

When the sands of life were running in the 
glass, it was customary for a filial placeman to 
obtain further pensions for his sons and daughters, 
on the obvious plea that it was cruel to cast young 
men and women, who had been reared in comfort 
on the mercies of a rough world. Thus the 
golden chain of Royal bounty held at least three 
lives together. The grandfather was First Lord 
of the Treasury or Chancellor of the Exchequer 
or Paymaster-General, and into his personal profits 
it would be invidious, even indecent, to enquire. 
He might make his eldest son, while still a boy at 
Eton, Clerk of the Estreats, and his second, before 



56 SEEING AND HEARING 

he took his degree at Cambridge, Usher of the 
Exchequer. Thus Lord-Chancellor Erskine made 
his son Secretary of Presentations when he was 
eighteen, and Charles Greville was appointed 
Secretary of Jamaica (where he never set his foot) 
before he was twenty. And then when, after fifty 
or sixty years of blameless enjoyment, the amiable 
sinecurist was nearing his last quarter-day, a 
benevolent Treasury intervened to save his maiden 
daughters or orphan nieces from pecuniary em- 
barrassment. It was of such *< near and dear 
relations" of a public man that Sydney Smith 
affirmed that their ^^ eating, drinking, washing, 
and clothing cost every man in the United King- 
dom twopence or threepence a year " ; and, to the 
critics who deprecated this commercial way of 
regarding the situation, he replied, with character- 
istic vigour : ^^ I have no idea that the Sophias and 
Carolines of any man breathing are to eat national 
veal, to drink public tea, to wear Treasury ribands, 
and then that we are to be told that it is coarse 
to animadvert upon this pitiful and eleemosynary 
splendour. If this is right, why not mention it ? 
If it is wrong, why should not he who enjoys the 
ease of supporting his sisters in this manner bear 
the shame of it ? " In thus writing of the Pension 
List as it stood in 1807, the admirable Sydney was 
at once the successor of Burke and the forerunner 
of Lord Grey. In 1780 Burke had addressed all 
the resources of his genius to the task of restoring 



PENSIONS 57 

the independence of Parliament by economical 
reform. It was, as Mr. Morley says, the number 
of sinecure places and unpublished pensions which 
" furnished the Minister with an irresistible lever." 
Burke found that " in sweeping away those facti- 
tious places and secret pensions he would be 
robbing the Court of its chief implements of cor- 
ruption and protecting the representative against 
his chief motive in selling his country." His 
power of oratory was reinforced by a minute 
knowledge of all the shady and shabby abuses, all 
the manifold and complicated corruptions, which 
had accumulated under the protection of the Royal 
name. The reformer's triumph was signal and 
complete. Vast numbers of sinecures were swept 
away, but some remained. The Pension List 
was closely curtailed, but pensions were still con- 
ferred. No public servant ever more richly earned 
a provision for his old age and decrepitude than 
Burke himself ; but when, broken by years and 
sorrows, he accepted a pension from the Crown, 
a Whig Duke of fabulous wealth, just thirty years 
old, had the temerity to charge him with a dis- 
creditable departure from his former principles of 
economic reform. The Duke was a booby : but 
his foolhardiness enriched English literature with 
* A Letter to a Noble Lord on the Attacks made 
on Mr. Burke and his Pension." To read that 
Letter, even after the lapse of no years, is to 
realize that, in spite of all corruption and all 



58 SEEING AND HEARING 

abuse, pecuniary rewards for political service need 
not be dishonourable or unreasonable. 

But corruption and abuse there were, and 
in sufficient quantities to justify all the bitter 
fun which ^^ Peter Plymley " poured upon the 
Cannings, the Jenkinsons, and the Percevals. The 
reform of the Pension List became a cardinal 
object of reforming Radicals ; and politicians like 
Joseph Hume, publicists like Albany Fonblanque, 
pursued it with incessant perseverance, 

"Till Grey went forth in 'Thirty-two to storm Corrup- 
tion's hold." 

In 1834 the first Reformed Parliament overhauled 
the whole system and brought some curious trans- 
actions into the light of day. Whereas up to that 
time the Pension List amounted to ^145,000 a 
year, it was now reduced to ;^75,ooo ; and its 
benefits were restricted to ** servants of the Crown 
and public, and to those who by their useful 
discoveries in science or attainments in literature 
and the arts had merited the gracious considera- 
tion of their Sovereign and the gratitude of their 
country." Vested interests were, of course, re- 
spected ; for had we not even compensated the 
slaveholders ? Two years ago one of these bene- 
ficiaries survived in a serene old age, and, for all 
I know, there may be others still spared to us, for, 
as Mr. G. A. Sala truly remarked, it never is safe 
to say that any one is dead, for if you do he is 



PENSIONS 59 

sure to write from the country and say he is only 
ninety-seven and never was better. 

A typical representative of the unreformed 
system was John Wilson Croker (i 780-1 857), 
whose literary efforts Macaulay trounced, and 
whose political utterances were thus described 
by Lord Beaconsfield : — 

*' There never was a fellow for giving a good 
hearty kick to the people like Rigby. Himself 
sprung from the dregs of the populace, this was 
disinterested. What could be more patriotic and 
magnanimous than his jeremiads over the fall of 
the Montmorencis and the Crillions, or the possible 
catastrophe of the Percys and the Seymours? 
The truth of all this hullabaloo was that Rigby 
had a sly pension which, by an inevitable associa- 
tion of ideas, he always connected with the main- 
tenance of an aristocracy. All his rigmarole 
dissertations on the French Revolution were im- 
pelled by this secret influence ; and, when he 
moaned like a mandrake over Nottingham Castle 
in flames, the rogue had an eye all the while to 
quarter-day." 

It was an evil day for those who love to grow 
rich upon the public money when Mr. Gladstone 
became the controller of the National Purse. One 
of his first acts was to revise the system of political 
pensions, which by an Act of 1869 was reconsti- 
tuted as it stands to-day. There are now three 
classes of persons entitled to pensions for services 



6o SEEING AND HEARING 

rendered in political office ; and the scale is 
arranged on that curious principle which also 
regulates the ^^ tips " to servants in a private house 
— that the larger your v^age is, the larger your 
gratuity shall be. Thus a Minister who has drawn 
;^5ooo a year is entitled after four years' service 
to a pension of ;^2 0oo a year ; he who has drawn 
;£300o a year for six years is entitled to ;^i20o a 
year ; while he who has laboured for ten years 
for the modest remuneration of ^^looo a year 
must be content with a pittance of ;^8oo a year. 
Qui habetj dabitur ei ; but with this restriction — that 
only four pensions of any one class can run con- 
currently. 

Politicians who had been brought up in the 
" spacious days " and generous methods of the 
older dispensation were by no means enamoured 
of what they used to call '^ Gladstone's cheese- 
paring economies." Sir William Gregory used to 
relate how, when, as a child, he asked Lord Mel- 
bourne for a fine red stick of official sealing-wax, 
that genial Minister thrust it into his hand, together 
with a bundle of quill pens, saying, '' You can't 
begin too early. All these things belong to the 
public, and your business in life must be to get 
out of the public all you can." An eminent 
statesman, trained in these traditions, had drawn 
from very early days a pension for an abolished 
office in Chancery. In due course he became a 
Cabinet Minister, and, when he fell from that high 



PENSIONS 6i 

estate, he duly pocketed his ;^2 00o a year. Later 
he came into a very large income, but this he 
obligingly saved for his nephews and nieces, living 
meanwhile on his twofold pension. 

I will conclude with a pleasanter anecdote. 
Until half-way through the last century it was 
customary to give a Speaker on retiring from the 
House of Commons a pension of ;£2ooo a year for 
two lives. It is related that in 1857 Mr. Speaker 
Shaw-Lefevre, on his elevation to the peerage as 
Lord Eversley, said that he could not endure the 
thought of imposing a burden on posterity, and 
would therefore take ;^4ooo a year for his own life 
instead of ;£2ooo a year for two. This public- 
spirited action was highly commended, and, as he 
lived till 1888, virtue was, as it ought always to 
be, its own reward. 



IX 

THE SEASON AS IT WAS 

The subject is worthy to be celebrated both in verse 
and in prose. Exactly sixty years ago Bulwer- 
Lytton, in his anonymous satire '* The NewTimon/' 
thus described the nocturnal aspect of the West 
End in that choice period of the year which to us 
Londoners is pre-eminently <' The Season " : — 

" O'er Royal London, in luxuriant May, 
While lamps yet twinkle, dawning creeps the day. 
Home from the hell the pale-eyed gamester steals ; 
Home from the ball flash jaded Beauty's wheels ; 
From fields suburban rolls the early cart ; 
So rests the Revel — so awakes the Mart." 

Twenty-four years later Lord Beaconsfield, in 

*' Lothair/' gave a vivid sketch of the same scenes 

as beheld by daylight : — 

**Town was beginning to blaze. Broughams 

whirled and bright barouches glanced, troops of 

social cavalry cantered and caracolled in morning 

rides, and the bells of prancing ponies, lashed by 

delicate hands, gingled in the laughing air. There 

were stoppages in Bond Street — which seems to 

62 



THE SEASON AS IT WAS 63 

cap the climax of civilization, after crowded clubs 
and swarming parks." 

It is curious that of the two descriptions the 
earlier needs much less revision than the later. 
Lamps still " twinkle " (though, to be sure, they 
are electric, whereas when Bulwer-Lytton wrote 
gas had barely ousted oil from its last fastness in 
Grosvenor Square). <^ Hells," though more euphe- 
mistically named, still invite the domiciliary visits 
of our much-aspersed police. '' Beauty " dances 
even more vigorously than in 1846, for Waltzes 
and Kitchen-Lancers and Washington Posts have 
superseded the decorous quadrilles which our 
mothers loved. And still the market-gardens of 
Acton and Ealing and Hounslow send their ^^ tower- 
ing squadrons " of waggons laden heavens-high with 
the fruits and vegetables for to-morrow's luncheon. 
In this merry month of May 1906 an observer, 
standing at Hyde Park Corner <^ when the night 
and morning meet," sees London substantially as 
Bulwer-Lytton saw it. 

But, when we turn to Lord Beaconsfield's 
description, the changes wrought by six-and-thirty 
years are curiously marked. '^ Bright barouches 
glanced." In the present day a Barouche, the 
handsomest and gracefullest of all open carriages, 
is as rare as an Auk's Egg or an original Folio of 
Shakespeare. Only two or three survive. One, 
richly dight in royal crimson, bears the Qneen, 
beautiful as Cleopatra in her barge. In another, 



64 SEEING AND HEARING 

almost imperially purple, Lady Londonderry sits 
enthroned ; a third, palely blue as the forget-me- 
not, carries Lady Carysfort ; but soon the tale 
of barouches ends. Victorias and landaus and 
" Clarences " and '^ Sociables " make the com- 
mon throng of carriages, and their serried ranks 
give way to the impetuous onrush of the noxious 
Motor or the milder impact of the Electric 
Brougham. 

^' Troops of social cavalry " were, when Lord 
Beaconsfield wrote '' Lothair," the characteristic 
glories of Rotten Row ; but horses and horseman- 
ship alike have waned. Men take their consti- 
tutional canter in costumes anciently confined to 
rat-catching, and the general aspect of Rotten 
Row suggests the idea of Mounted Infantry 
rather than of ^' Cavalry." Alongside the ride 
forty years ago ladies drove their pony-phaetons 
— a pretty practice and a pretty carriage ; but 
both have utterly disappeared, and the only 
bells that *^ gingle in the laughing air " are 
the warning signals of the Petrol Fiend, as, 
bent on destruction, he swoops down from 
Marble Arch to Piccadilly. Does a captious 
critic gaze enquiringly on the unfamiliar verb 
to '' gingle " ? It was thus that Lord Beacons- 
field wrote it in '< Lothair " ; even as in the 
same high romance he described a lady with 
a rich bunch of ^' Stephanopolis " in her hand. 
It is not for the ephemeral scribbler to correct 



THE SEASON AS IT WAS 65 

the orthography of the immortal dead. As to 
^' stoppages in Bond Street," they were isolated 
and noteworthy incidents in 1870; in 1906, thanks 
to the admission of omnibuses into the narrow 
thoroughfare, they are occurrences as regular as 
the postman's knock or the policeman's mailed 
tread. 

We have seen the aspects in which the London 
Season presented itself to two great men of yore. 
Let me now descend to a more personal level. 
We will imagine ourselves transported back to the 
year 1880, and to the month of May. A young 
gentleman — some five-and-twenty summers, as 
Mr. G. P. R. James would have said, have passed 
over his fair head — is standing near the steps of 
St. George's Hospital between the hours of eleven 
and midnight. He is smartly dressed in evening 
clothes, with a white waistcoat, a gardenia in his 
button-hole, and a silver-crutched stick in his 
hand. He is smoking a cigarette and pondering 
the question where he shall spend his evening, or, 
more strictly, the early hours of next day. He is 
in a state of serene contentment with himself and 
the world, for he has just eaten an excellent dinner, 
where plovers' eggs and asparagus have reminded 
him that the Season has really begun. To the 
pleasure-seeking Londoner these symptoms of re- 
turning summer mean more, far more, than the 
dogrose in the hedgerow or the first note of the 
nightingale in the copse. Since dinner he has 

E 



66 SEEING AND HEARING 

just looked in at an evening party, which bored 
him badly, and has ^' cut " two others where he 
was not so likely to be missed. And now arises 
the vital question of the Balls. I use the plural 
number, for there will certainly be two, and prob- 
ably three, to choose from. Here, at St. George's 
Hospital, our youth is at the centre of the world's 
social concourse. A swift and unbroken stream 
of carriages is pouring down from Grosvenor 
Square and Mayfair to Belgrave Square and Eaton 
Square and Chesham Place, and it meets as it 
goes the ascending procession which begins in 
Belgravia and ends in Portman Square. To-night 
there is a Royal Ball at Grosvenor House, certainly 
the most stately event of the season ; a little dance, 
exquisitely gay and bright, in Piccadilly ; and a 
gorgeous entertainment in Prince's Gate, where 
the aspiring Distiller is struggling, with enormous 
outlay, into social fame. All these have solicited 
the honour of our young friend's presence, and 
now is the moment of decision. It does not 
take long to repudiate Prince's Gate ; there will 
be the best band in London, and ortolans for 
supper, but there will be no one there that one 
ever saw before, and it is too sickening to be 
called ^' My boy " by that bow- windowed bounder, 
the master of the house. There remain Gros- 
venor House and Piccadilly, and happily these can 
be combined in a harmonious perfection. Gros- 
venor House shall come first, for the arrival of 



THE SEASON AS IT WAS 67 

the Prince and Princess is a pageant worth seeing 
— the most gracious host and the most beautiful 
hostess in London ushering the Royal guests, 
with courtly pomp, into the great gallery, walled 
with the canvases of Rubens, which serves as 
the dancing-room. Then the fun begins, and the 
bright hours fly swiftly, till one o'clock suggests 
the tender thought of supper, which is served on 
gold plate and Sevres china in a garden-tent of 
Gobehns tapestry. And now it is time for a 
move ; and our youth, extricating himself from 
the undesired attentions of the linkmen, pops into 
a hansom and speeds to Piccadilly, where he finds 
delights of a different kind — no Royalty, no pomp, 
no ceremony ; but a warm welcome, and all his 
intimate friends, and the nicest girls in London 
eager for a valse. 

As day begins to peep, he drinks his crown- 
ing tumbler of champagne-cup, and strolls home 
under the opalescent dawn, sniffing the fragrance 
from pyramids of strawberries as they roll to- 
wards Covent Garden, and exchanging a friendly 
'' Good night " with the policeman on the beat, 
who seems to think that '< Good morning " would 
be a more suitable greeting. So to bed, with 
the cheerful consciousness of a day's work well 
done, and the even more exhilarating prospect 
of an unbroken succession of such days, full of 
feasting and dancing and riding and polo and 
lawn-tennis, till August stifles the Season with 



68 SEEING AND HEARING 

its dust and drives the revellers to Homburg or 
the moors. 

But I awake, and lo ! it is a dream, though a 
dream well founded on reality. For I have been 
describing the London Season as it was when the 
world was young. 

" When all the world is old, lad, 

And all the trees are brown ; 
And all the sport is stale, lad, 

And all the wheels run down ; 
Creep home, and take your place there. 

The spent and maimed among : 
God grant you find one face there, 

You loved when all was young." 



THE SEASON AS IT IS 

That delicate critic, the late Mr. William Cory, 
observes in one of his letters that Virgil's 

" Sunt lacrymae rerum, et mentem mortalia tangunt " 

has its modern equivalent in Wordsworth's 

*' Men are we, and must grieve when even the shade 
Of that which once was great is passed away." 

The full luxury of that grief is reserved for those 
who, a decade hence, shall moralize on ^' the 
London Season," for the thing which now we so 
describe will then have utterly perished, and its 
name will only arouse a tender and regretful 
emotion. Even now we have seen its glories fade, 
and soon it will have shared the fate of those 
Venetian splendours which Wordsworth mourned. 
But in the meantime it still exists, though in a 
vastly different form from that which it wore in 
mid-Victorian years. Just now I was describing 
some of the changes which have occurred since 
the distant days when Bulwer-Lytton and Lord 
Beaconsfield described London in May ; and, 

following humbly in their wake, I endeavoured to 

69 



70 SEEING AND HEARING 

depict it as it was when I had my part in it. But 
change only yields place to change. Society, like 
the individuals who compose it, passes onward in 
perpetual vicissitude. As Shelley says, '^ Naught 
may endure but mutability." So the London 
Season of 1906 differs as notably from the 
Season of 1880 as the Season of 1880 from that 
of 1846. Let me catalogue some of the changes 
and try to account for them. In the first place, 
the Season is much less exactly circumscribed by 
dates. In days gone by, it began with the Opening 
of Parliament, which was always about the 7th of 
February, and it lasted, with its regular inter- 
missions for Easter and Whitsuntide, till the last 
week of July. Then Society transported itself in 
turn to Goodwood, to Cowes, and to a German 
watering-place or a Scotch moor, according to its 
physical condition, and it was darkly rumoured 
that, if people found themselves compelled by 
domestic or financial reasons to remain in London 
during August, they sought to escape detection by 
keeping the windows fronting the street closely 
shuttered, and lived in their back rooms in un- 
broken contemplation of the leads and the mews. 
If you chanced to meet a man in Piccadilly in 
September, you might be sure that he would be 
wearing country clothes and would assure you that 
he was only '' passing through " between Doncaster 
and Scotland. Nowadays the Season has no par- 
ticular limits. London is nearly as full in December 



THE SEASON AS IT IS 71 

as it is in May. Dinners and plays and suppers at 
restaurants are as frequent, and, barring the fogs, 
as bright, at Christmas as at Midsummer. Even 
in September Clubland is not deserted ; and there 
are people bold enough to defy the world by re- 
turning from their summer exodus as early as 
October. The reason for the change, as for many 
others like it, is the reduction of territorial incomes. 
1880 may be taken as, roughly, the last of the 
good years for agriculture. The incessant rains 
of 1879 had even then begun to tell their tale. 
Tenants were asking for big reductions, and farms 
hitherto eagerly sought were becoming unlettable. 
I know a landowner on a great scale who, a year 
or two later, only pocketed 10 per cent, of his in- 
come from land, whereas five years before he 
would have thought an abatement of 10 per cent. 
disastrous. All this has told increasingly on social 
life, for people found themselves unable to keep 
both a country house and a London house going 
at the same time, and, being driven to choose 
between the two, often decided to let the country 
house and its shooting and make London their 
headquarters for the whole year. So, by degrees, 
autumn faded imperceptibly into winter, winter 
into spring, and spring into summer. Each 
season in its turn found people dwelling peace- 
ably in their urban habitations, entertaining and 
being entertained ; and so '' the Season " lost its 
sharp edges. The meeting of Parliament brought 



72 SEEING AND HEARING 

no perceptible change in the aspect of the town, 
^' High Midsummer Pomps " were no longer so 
^' high " as in former years, but, per contra^ there 
was much more gaiety in the autumn and winter 
and early spring. 

Another cause which has contributed to the 
effacement of the ancient time-marks is that the 
Court tends to disregard them. Under the present 
reign, Windsor Castle has become as much a social 
centre as Buckingham Palace. There are banquets 
in St. George's Hall in December, as well as 
garden-parties on the the Slopes in June ; and so, 
under the action of Royal influence, the social 
seasons melt into one another, like the hues of the 
prism. Then, again, the practice of the '' Week- 
end," imported from Lancashire and sanctioned 
by Westminster, helps to denude the town in 
summer ; for the '^ end " tends naturally to prolong 
itself till it overlaps the beginning, and Friday-to- 
Tuesday parties, treading on the heels of Whitsun- 
tide and to be followed in quick succession by 
Ascot, make mish-mash of what was aforetime 
" an entire and perfect chrysolite" — a complete 
and continuous whole. 

In describing my hero of 1880 as he surveyed 
his evening's amusements and chose the most 
rewarding, I took for granted that he had at least 
three balls to choose from. Nowadays he is 
lucky if he has one. Here again, and con- 
spicuously, agricultural depression has made its 



THE SEASON AS IT IS 73 

mark. In the years between 1870 and 1880, 
during an unbroken spell of good trade and good 
harvests, rich people struggled with one another 
for a vacant night on which to entertain their 
friends. For example, Lady A. had just brought 
out a daughter, and wished to give a ball for her 
benefit. Say that she set her affections on 
Monday the 28th of May. Before she issued her 
cards she took counsel with all her friends, for in 
those days ball-giving mothers were a sort of 
Limited Company, and all knew one another. 
She found that Mrs. B. had mentally fixed on 
Tuesday, 29th, and, if Mrs. C. had thought of 
Monday, she would be so kind as to take Wed- 
nesday, 30th. So all was amicably agreed ; there 
would be no clashing, which would be such a pity 
and would spoil both balls ; and the cards were 
duly issued. Directly afterwards, as if moved by 
some occult and fiendish impulse, the Duchess 

of D pounced on Monday, 28th, for a Royal 

Ball at D House, or, worse still because more 

perilously tempting, for a ^' very small dance," 
to which all the nicest young men would go, 
and where they would stay till three. In the face 
of such mortifications as these, the emulous hospi- 
talities of the aspiring Distiller were of no account ; 
for the ^' nice men " would either disregard them, 
or, having looked in for half-an-hour, would come 
on to spend the night at the houses where they 
felt themselves at home. 



74 SEEING AND HEARING 

The hero of 1880, if only he was well connected, 
well mannered, and sufficiently well known, might 
fairly reckon on dining six nights out of the seven 
at a host's expense. Indeed, if he was at all 
popular, he could safely afford to decline the invi- 
tation which old Mr. Wellbore issued six weeks in 
advance and reserve himself for a livelier meal at 
shorter notice. Not so to-day. Our young friend, 
if he has a constitutional objection to paying for 
his own dinner, must take what he can get in the 
way of invitations, and not be too particular about 
the cook or the company. Here the cause of 
change is not decrease of wealth. As long as 
there is a balance at the bank, and even when 
there is none, people will dine ; and dinner-giving 
is the last form of hospitality which Society will 
let die. But nowadays dinners are made ancillary 
to Bridge. If our friend cannot afford to lose 
^50 in an evening he will not be asked to dine at 
a house which reckons itself as belonging to '^ the 
Mode " ; or if, for old acquaintance' sake, he is 
allowed to find a place at the dinner-table, he is 
compelled to sit all the evening by the least attrac- 
tive daughter of the house, or to listen to some 
fogey, too fossilized for Bridge, discoursing on the 
iniquities of Mr. Birrell's Bill. ^^ Tobacco," said 
Lord Beaconsfield, ^' is the Tomb of Love." If 
he were with us now, he would pronounce that 
Bridge is the Extinguisher of Hospitality. 

Yet once again I note a startling discrepancy 



THE SEASON AS IT IS 75 

between the Season as it was and the Season as 
it is. Then a young man who wanted air and 
exercise in the afternoon played tennis at Lord's, 
or skated at Prince's, or took a gallop in Richmond 
Park, or, if he was very adventurous and up-to- 
date, sped out to Hampton Court or Windsor on 
a bone-shaking bicycle six feet high. All these 
recreations are possible to him to-day ; but all 
have yielded to motoring. Dressed in the most 
unbecoming of all known costumes, his expressive 
eyes concealed by goggles, and his graceful pro- 
portions swathed in oilskin, he urges his mad 
career to Brighton or Stratford or Salisbury Plain. 
No doubt he has the most fascinating companions 
in the world, for girls are enthusiastic motorists ; 
but I fancy that Edwin and Angelina presented a 
more attractive appearance when, neatly dressed 
and beautifully mounted, they rode in the cool of 
the evening along the shady side of Rotten Row. 

However, I am a kind of social ^^ Old Mortality " 
rummaging among the tombs of what has been 
and can be no more, and I fancy that Old Mor- 
tality's opinions on youth and beauty would have 
been justly disregarded. 



XI 

THE SINS OF SOCIETY 

In the year 1870 a flame of rellgous zeal was 
suddenly kindled in the West End of London. 
In that year the Rev. George Howard Wilkinson 
(now Bishop of St. Andrews) was appointed Vicar 
of St. Peter's, Eaton Square. The church in the 
Belgravian district was as dry as tinder ; it caught 
fire from Mr. Wilkinson's fervour, and the fire 
soon became a conflagration. This is Matthew 
Arnold's description of the great preacher at the 
height of his power : ^* He was so evidently sincere, 
more than sincere, burnt up with sorrow, that he 
carried every one with him, and half the church 
was in tears. I do not much believe in good 
being done by a man unless he can give lighiy and 
Wilkinson's fire is very turbid ; but his power 
of heating, penetrating, and agitating is extra- 
ordinary." This description belongs to the year 
1872, but it might have been written with equal 
truth at any date between 1870 and 1883. In 
all my experience of preaching (which is long, 
wide, and varied) I have never seen a congregation 

dominated by its minister so absolutely as the 

76 



THE SINS OF SOCIETY 77 

congregation of St. Peter's was dominated by Mr. 
Wilkinson. I say *' congregation " advisedly, for 
I should think that at least half the seatholders 
belonged to other parishes. The smartest carriages 
in London blocked the approach to the church. 
The great dames of Grosvenor Square and Carlton 
House Terrace rubbed shoulders with the opulent 
inhabitants of Tyburnia and South Kensington, 
Cabinet Ministers fought for places in the gallery, 
and M.P.'s were no more accounted of than silver 
in the days of Solomon. 

And this was not a mere assemblage of hearers. 
The congregation of St. Peter's were pre-eminently 
givers. ;^40oo a year was the regular product of 
the alms-bags, let alone the innumerable sums 
sent privately to the Vicar. ^^ I want a thousand 
pounds." This simple but emphatic statement 
from the pulpit one Sunday was succeeded on the 
following Sunday by the quiet announcement, '^ I 
have got a thousand pounds." What was the 
secret of this attraction ? It was entirely personal. 
It did not in the least depend on theological bias. 
Mr. Wilkinson belonged to no party. He had 
begun life as an Evangelical, and he retained the 
unction and fervour which were characteristic of 
that school at its best ; but he was feeling his way 
towards a higher churchmanship, and had dis- 
carded most of his earlier shibboleths. The fabric 
was frankly hideous, and the well-meant attempts 
to make it look less like a barn and more like a 



78 SEEING AND HEARING 

church only resulted in something between a 
mosque and a synagogue. There was no ritualism. 
The music was too elaborate for the choir, and 
the curates were feeble beyond all description. 
The Vicar was everything ; and even he had none 
of the gifts which are commonly supposed to make 
a Popular Preacher. He was not the least flum- 
mery or flowery. He was reserved and dignified 
in manner, and his language was quite unadorned. 
His voice was a monotonous moan, occasionally 
rising into a howl. He was conspicuously free 
from the tendency to prophesy smooth things, 
and he even seemed to take a delight in rubbing 
the pungent lotion of his spiritual satire into the 
sore places of the hearers' conscience. If Jeremiah 
had prophesied in a surplice, he would have been 
like the Prophet of Belgravia ; and as for Savona- 
rola, his sermon, as paraphrased in chapter xxiv. 
of ^' Romola," might have been delivered, with 
scarcely a word altered, from the pulpit of St. 
Peter's. 

And here we touch the pith and core of Mr. 
Wilkinson's preaching. He rebuked the Sins of 
Society as no one had ventured to rebuke them 
since the days of Whitefield and the Wesleys. The 
Tractarian Movement, so heart-searching, so con- 
science-stirring at Oxford, had succumbed in the 
fashionable parts of London to the influences 
which surrounded it, and had degenerated into a 
sort of easy-going ceremonialism — partly anti- 



THE SINS OF SOCIETY 79 

quarian, partly worldly, and wholly ineffective for 
spiritual revival or moral reformation. Into this 
Dead Sea of lethargy and formalism Mr. Wilkinson 
burst like a gunboat. He scattered his fire left 
and right, aimed high and aimed low, blazed and 
bombarded without fear or favour ; sent some 
crafts to the bottom, set fire to others, and covered 
the sea with wreckage. In less metaphorical lan- 
guage, he rebuked the sins of all and sundry, from 
Duchesses to scullery-maids. Premiers to page- 
boys, octogenarian rakes to damsels in their teens. 
Then, as now, Society loved to be scolded, and 
the more Mr. Wilkinson thundered the more it 
crowded to his feet. '^ Pay your bills." '' Get up 
when you are called." '^ Don't stay till three at a 
ball and then say that you are too delicate for 
early services." ^' Eat one dinner a day instead 
of three, and try to earn that one." ^^ Give up 
champagne for the season, and what you save on 
your wine-merchant's bill send to the Mission 
Field." '' You are sixty-five years old and have 
not been confirmed. Never too late to mend. 
Join a Confirmation Class at once, and try to 
remedy, by good example now, all the harm you 
have done your servants or your neighbours by 
fifty years' indifference." ^' Sell that diamond 
cross which you carry with you into the sin- 
polluted atmosphere of the Opera, give the pro- 
ceeds to feed the poor, and wear the only real 
cross — the cross of self-discipline and self-denial." 



8o SEEING AND HEARING 

These are echoes — faint, indeed, but not, I think, 
unfaithful — of thirty years ago, and they have 
suddenly been awoke from their long slumber by 
the sermons which Father Vaughan has just been 
preaching at the Jesuits' Church in Farm Street, 
Mayfair. The good Father, exalting his own 
church, perhaps a little unduly, at the expense of 
the Anglican churches in the district, observed 
complacently that ^' Farm Street, in spite of its 
extension, was all too small " for its congregation. 
For my own part, I do not belong to that fold, 
and I never wander to strange churches for the 
pleasure of having my ears tickled ; so I only know 
Father Vaughan's utterances as they reach me 
through the newspapers. A report in the third 
person always tends to enfeeble rhetoric ; but, in 
spite of that hindrance. Father Vaughan's style 
seems to lack nothing in the way of emphasis or 
directness. Here is a fragment of his sermon 
preached on Sunday the loth of June 1906 : — 

'' It was no easy task for the votaries of pleasure 
when Sunday came round to all of a sudden forget 
their class distinctions, their privileged sets, their 
social successes, their worldly goods, and to re- 
member that they were going into the presence of 
Him before whom man and woman were not what 
they happened to have, but what they happened to 
be — that the debutante beauty might be before 
God less than her maid who waited up half the 
night for her, nay, less than the meanest scullery- 



THE SINS OF SOCIETY 8i 

maid below stairs ; while the millionaire with means 
to buy up whole countries might be in God's sight 
far less pleasing and very much more guilty than 
the lowest groom in his stable yard." 

Not less vigorous was the allocution of June 17. 

'Mf Dives, who was buried in Hell, were to 
revisit the earth he would most surely have the 
entree to London's smartest set to-day. He would 
be literally pelted with invitations. And why not ? 
Dives, so well groomed and turned out, with such 
a well-lined larder and so well-stocked a cellar, 
would be the very ideal host to cultivate. He 
would ^ do you so well,' you would meet the ' right 
people at his place,' and you could always bring 
your ' latest friend.' Besides, what a good time 
one would have at his house-parties, where there 
would be no fear of being bored or dull 1 " ^ 

And yet again : — 

^* It was well when the winning-card fell into 
their hands, for then there was just a chance of 
some dressmaker or tradesman being paid some- 
thing on account before becoming bankrupt. With 
such examples of the misuse of wealth before 
their eyes, it was a wonder there were not more 
Socialists than there actually were." 

All the memories of my youth have been re- 
vived by Father Vaughan. Instead of 1906, 
1876 ; instead of the Gothic gloom of Farm 

1 Here I seem to catch an echo of Dr. Pusey's sermon on *• Why 
did Dives lose his soul ? " 

F 



82 SEEING AND HEARING 

Street, the tawdry glare of St. Peter's, Eaton 
Square ; instead of a Jesuit Father in the pulpit, 
a vigorous Protestant who renounces the Pope 
and all his works and glories in the Angli- 
canism of the Church of England. Grant those 
differences, which after all are more incidental 
than essential, and the sermons exactly reproduce 
those stirring days when the present Bishop of 
St. Andrews ^^ shook the arsenal " of fashion, 
'^thundered over" London, and achieved, as his 
admirers said, the supreme distinction of spoiling 
the London Season. 

I am convinced that the Higher Critics of a 
later age, collating the Wilkinsonian tradition with 
such fragments as remain of Father Vaughan's 
discourses, will come to the conclusion that 
*^ Wilkinson " never existed (except in Words- 
worth's ode to the Spade), but was a kind of heroic 
figure conceived by a much later generation, which 
had quivered under the rhetoric of a real person 
or persons called Vaughan ; and the opinion of 
the learned will be sharply divided on such 
questions as whether Vaughan was one or many ; 
if one, whether he was a Priest, a Cardinal, a 
Head Master, or an Independent Minister ; or 
whether he was all four at different stages of his 
career. 



XII 

OXFORD 

" Once, my dear — but the world was young then — 
Magdalen elms and Trinity limes, — 
Lissom the oars and backs that swung then, 
Eight good men in the good old times — 
Careless we and the chorus flung then. 
Under St. Mary's chimes ! 

" Still on her spire the pigeons hover ; 
Still by her gateway flits the gown ; 
Ah, but her secret ? You, young lover, 

Drumming her old ones forth from town, 
Know you the secret none discover? 

Tell it — when you go down." 

What Matthew Arnold did for the interpretation 
of Oxford through the medium of prose, that Mr. 
Quiller-Couch has done through the medium of 
verse. In the poem from which I have just quoted 
two stanzas he conveys, as no one else has ever 
conveyed it in poetry, the tender and elusive charm 
of that incomparable place. 

" Know you her secret none can utter — 
Hers of the Book, the tripled Crown ? " 

It is a hard question, and susceptible of some very 

83 



84 SEEING AND HEARING 

prosaic and therefore inappropriate answers. The 
true answer can^ I think, only be given by those 
for whom Oxford lies, half hid, in the enchanted 
past : ^' Tell it — when you go down." 

Some parts of the spell which Oxford exercises 
on those who are subjected to her influence are in 
no sense secret. We perceive them from the day 
when we first set foot within her precincts, and 
the sense of them abides with us for ever. 

" If less insensible than sodden clay 
In a sea-river's bed at ebb of tide," 

all sons of Oxford must realize her material beauty, 
her historical pre-eminence, her contribution to 
thought and culture, her influence on the religious 
life of England. 

"Ah, but her secret? You, young lover." 

There is nothing secret about all this ; it is palp- 
able and manifest ; and yet it does not exhaust 
the spell. Something there is that remains un- 
discovered, or at best half-discovered — felt and 
guessed at, but not clearly apprehended — until we 
have passed away from the '' dreaming spires " — 
the cloisters and the gardens and the river — to 
that sterner life for which these mysterious en- 
chantments have been preparing us. 

" Know you the secret none discover?" 

If you do, that is proof that time has done its work 
and has brought to the test of practical result the 
influences which were shaping your mind and, 



OXFORD 85 

still more potently, your heart, between eighteen 
and twenty-two. What that ^' secret " is, let an 
unworthy son of Oxford try to tell. 

To begin with a negative, it is not the secret of 
Nirvana. There are misguided critics abroad in 
the land who seem to assume that life lived easily 
in a beautiful place, amid a society which includes 
all knowledge in its comprehensive survey, and far 
remote from the human tragedy of poverty and 
toil and pain, must necessarily be calm. And so, 
as regards the actual work and warfare of man- 
kind, it may be. The bitter cry of starving Poplar 
does not very readily penetrate to the well-spread 
table of an Oxford common-room. In a labur- 
num-clad villa in the Parks we can afford to 
reason very temperately about life in cities where 
five families camp in one room. But when we 
leave the actualities of life and come to the region 
of thought and opinion, all the pent energy of 
Oxford seethes and stirs. The Hebrew word for 
^* Prophet " comes, I believe, from a root which 
signifies to bubble like water on the flames ; and 
in this fervency of thought and feeling Oxford is 
characteristically prophetic. It is a tradition that 
in some year of the passion-torn 'forties the sub- 
ject for the Newdigate Prize Poem was Cromwell, 
whereas the subject for the corresponding poem at 
Cambridge was Plato. In that selection Oxford 
was true to herself. For a century at least (even 
if we leave out of sight her earlier convulsions) she 



86 SEEING AND HEARING 

has been the battle-field of contending sects. Her 
air has resounded with party-cries, and the dead 
bodies of the controversially slain have lain thick 
in her streets. All the opposing forces of Church 
and State, of theology and politics, of philosophy 
and science, of literary and social and economic 
theory, have contended for mastery in the place 
which Matthew Arnold, with rare irony, described 
as ^* so unruffled by the fierce intellectual life of our 
century, so serene ! " Every succeeding genera- 
tion of Oxford men has borne its part in these ever- 
recurring strifes. To hold aloof from them would 
have been poltroonery. Passionately convinced 
(at twenty) that we had sworn ourselves for life to 
each cause which we espoused, we have pleaded 
and planned and denounced and persuaded ; have 
struck the shrewdest blows which our strength 
could compass, and devised the most dangerous 
pitfalls which wit could suggest. Nothing came 
of it all, and nothing could come, except the ruin 
of our appointed studies and the resulting disloca- 
tion of all subsequent life. But we were obeying 
the irresistible impulse of the time and the place in 
which our lot was cast, and we were ready to risk 
our all upon the venture. 

'' Never we wince, though none deplore us, 
We who go reaping that we sowed ; 
Cities at cockcrow wake before us — 

Hey, for the lilt of the London road ! 
One look back, and a rousing chorus ! 
Never a palinode ! " 



OXFORD 87 

It is when we have finally sung that chorus and 
have travelled a few miles upon that road, that we 
learn the secret which we never discovered while 
as yet Oxford held us in the thick of the fight. 
We thought then that we were the most desperate 
partizans ; we asked no quarter, and gave none ; 
pushed our argumentative victories to their utter- 
most consequences, and made short work of a 
fallen foe. But, when all the old battle-cries have 
died out of our ears, we begin to perceive humaner 
voices. All at once we realize that a great part of 
our old contentions was only sound and fury and 
self-deception, and that, though the causes for 
which we strove may have been absolutely right, 
our opponents were not necessarily villains. In a 
word, we have learnt the Secret of Oxford. All 
the time that we were fighting and fuming, the 
higher and subtler influences of the place were 
moulding us, unconscious though we were, to a 
more gracious ideal. We had really learnt to 
distinguish between intellectual error and moral 
obliquity. We could differ from another on every 
point of the political and theological compass, 
and yet in our hearts acknowledge him to be 
the best of all good fellows. Without surren- 
dering a single conviction, we came to see 
the virtue of so stating our beliefs as to per- 
suade and propitiate, instead of offending and 
alienating. We had attained to that temper 
which, in the sphere of thought and opinion, 



88 SEEING AND HEARING 

is analogous to the crowning virtue of Christian 
charity. 

" Tell it — when you go down. " 

Lately it has been my privilege to address a 
considerable gathering of Oxford undergraduates, 
all keenly alive to the interests and controversies 
of the present hour, all devotedly loyal to the 
tradition of Oxford as each understood it, and all 
with their eyes eagerly fixed on '' the wistful limit 
of the world." With such an audience it was 
inevitable to insist on the graces and benedictions 
which Oxford can confer, and to dwell on Mr. 
Gladstone's dogma that to call a man a ^^ typically 
Oxford man " is to bestow the highest possible 
praise. 

But this was not all. Something more re- 
mained to be said. It was for a speaker who had 
travelled for thirty years on ^' the London road " 
to state as plainly as he could his own deepest 
obligation to the place which had decided the 
course and complexion of his life. And, when 
it was difficult to express that obligation in the 
pedestrian prose of an after-dinner speech, he 
turned for succour to the poet who sang of ^^ the 
secret none discover." Wherever philosophical 
insight is combined with literary genius and 
personal charm, one says instinctively, '< That man 
is, or ought to be, an Oxford man." Chiefest 
among the great names which Oxford ought to 
claim but cannot is the name of Edmund Burke ; 



OXFORD 89 

and the ^^ Secret " on which we have been discours- 
ing seems to be conveyed with luminous precision 
in his description of the ideal character : '^ It is 
our business ... to bring the dispositions that 
are lovely in private life into, the service and 
conduct of the commonwealth ; so to be patriots 
as not to forget we are gentlemen ; to cultivate 
friendships and to incur enmities ; to have both 
strong, but both selected— in the one to be 
placable, in the other immovable." Whoso has 
attained to that ideal has learnt the ^' Secret " of 
Oxford. 



XIII 

SCHOOLS FOR SHEPHERDS 

"The hungry sheep look up, and are not fed." 

Why not ? Because the Shepherds are so im- 
perfectly trained for their business. This, at any 
rate, is the testimony of a Canon (sometime 
Examining Chaplain to a Bishop) who at the 
Diocesan Conference at Ely the other day de- 
clared that the clergy were ^^ not qualified to pro- 
vide instruction in Church Doctrine for the laity 
because they were not properly trained '' ; and 
further testified that '^ Nonconformist Ministers 
were much better trained" than the Enghsh 
Clergy. This testimony from a superior Shepherd 
is rather startling for the Sheep, and it suggests 
some interesting comparisons. It is, I take it, 
unquestionable that Nonconformist ministers and 
Roman Catholic priests alike have much more of 
a technical education than is thought necessary 
for their Anglican brothers. They are, so to say, 
caught early, and their studies from seventeen or 
eighteen onwards are directed steadily towards 
their appointed work in life. A Roman Seminarist 

learns his Latin and Greek as subsidiary to higher 

90 



SCHOOLS FOR SHEPHERDS 91 

studies ; he spends, I believe, two years in Philo- 
sophy and four in Theology, and is harassed by 
incessant examinations. The training of the youth 
who aspires to the Nonconformist ministry is of 
much the same kind. '' Moral Theology," in 
other words the Science of the Confessional, he 
naturally does not learn ; but, on the other hand, 
he is sedulously trained for the work of public 
speaking and preaching. " If you can't preach," 
said Spurgeon to his students at Stockwell, '' it is 
a clear proof that God doesn't mean you to be 
a preacher, and you must choose some other 
occupation." 

Vastly different is the training of the Eng- 
lish Curate. Private School, Public School, and 
University: cricket, football, rowing: elementary 
Greek and Latin, and a smattering of Law or 
History — these constitute his '' atmosphere," his 
moral and mental discipline, between the ages of 
ten and twenty-three. Even more remarkable is 
his theological equipment. In ninety-nine cases 
out of a hundred, he knows absolutely nothing 
about the Church of which he is to be a minister, 
her doctrines, history, or practical system. He 
has been enveloped from his youth up by a hazy 
atmosphere of Undogmatic Religion. I well re- 
member that an Undergraduate friend of mine, 
who came to Oxford from Dr. Temple's Sixth 
Form at Rugby, declined to believe that there 
are two Sacraments. That there was a religious 



92 SEEING AND HEARING 

ceremony called ''The Sacrament," for which 
some people stayed after the ordinary service, 
he was well aware, as also that infants were 
ceremonially sprinkled ; but that this latter cere- 
mony was a Sacrament he could not be induced 
to believe. During his last year at Oxford he 
informed himself better on this and some similar 
topics, and a year afterwards was preaching, with 
great acceptance, to a fashionable congregation. 
From what I knew of my friend's theological 
attainments, I should imagine that the Bishop's 
Examination could not have been a very terrifying 
process ; but forty years earlier it must have been 
even less formidable. The Hon. and Rev. George 
Spencer (uncle of the present Lord Spencer) was 
destined from an early age for the Family Living 
in Northamptonshire. He hunted and shot, and 
danced, and travelled on the Continent, and held 
a commission in the Yeomanry. After two years 
at Trinity College, Cambridge, he took a " Noble- 
man's Degree," and, when he neared the canonical 
age of twenty-three, he wrote to the Bishop of 
Peterborough's Examining Chaplain offering him- 
self for Ordination and asking advice as to his 
preparation. The examiner — ah, would that there 
were more Hke him 1 — wrote back : — 

" It is impossible that I should ever entertain 
any idea of subjecting a gentleman with whose 
talents and good qualities I am so well acquainted 
as I am with yours to any examination except as 



SCHOOLS FOR SHEPHERDS 93 

a matter of form, for which a verse in the Greek 
Testament and an Article of the Church of Eng- 
land returned into Latin will be amply sufficient." 

This reassuring letter was written on the 12th 
of October 1822, and on the 22nd of December 
next ensuing George Spencer was ordained Deacon 
and a year later Priest. " On the evening before 
the ordination, whilst the Bishop and various 
clergymen and their ladies and the candidates 
amused themselves with a rubber of whist, Mr. 
Spencer refused to play." And the refusal was 
considered, as perhaps it was, noteworthy. 

The Movement which issued from Oxford in 
1833 introduced some inprovement into the 
method of conducting ordinations, as into other 
departments of the Church's work. The exami- 
nation became, though not yet very serious, at 
least a little less farcical, and some attempt was 
made in charges and sermons to urge upon the 
candidates the gravity of what they were under- 
taking. But, according to the late Bishop Wood- 
ford, '' the evenings, during which they were left 
to themselves, became evenings of social enjoy- 
ment, if not of boisterous merriment, in which the 
features of an old college supper-party were re- 
produced, rather than intervals of solemn thought 
and retirement." 

Bishop Samuel Wilberforce raised the standard 
of what was expected in the way of Scriptural 
and theological knowledge ; he made the exami- 



94 SEEING AND HEARING 

nation a reality ; he laid special stress on sermon- 
writing ; and he made the Ember Week a season 
of spiritual retirement in which men about to take 
the most decisive step in life might be brought 
face to face with the responsibilities involved in 
their decision. The example set by Wilberforce 
was followed, sooner or later, by every bishop on 
the bench ; the requirements have been raised, and 
the system has been developed and improved ; 
but the credit of initiation belongs to that epoch- 
making episcopate, which began in 1845 and 
ended, through a false step made by a horse on 
the Surrey Downs, on the 19th of July 1873. 

It soon became apparent to those who had the 
spiritual interests of the Church at heart that 
something more than twelve months' book-work 
and a week of religious retirement was required to 
wean the ordinary B.A. from the puerilities — if 
nothing worse — of his Undergraduate life, and to 
equip him for a life of Pastorship and Teachership. 
The sense of this need gave rise to the creation 
of Theological Colleges, where a man who looked 
forward to Holy Orders might, after taking his 
ordinary degree at Oxford or Cambridge, apply 
himself to the studies more specially necessary for 
his chosen work, and — even more important still — 
might acquire the habits of methodical and self- 
disciplined life. The idea took shape in such 
foundations as the Theological Colleges of Wells, 
Cuddesdon, Sarum, and Ely, the Scholce Cancellarii 



SCHOOLS FOR SHEPHERDS 95 

at Lincoln, and the Clergy School at Leeds. 
Fighting their way through all manner of strange 
misrepresentations about Monasticism and Medi- 
aevalism, they have in the course of years attained 
to recognition, popularity, and apparent stability. 
The bishops patronize them warmly, and incum- 
bents who desire curates not wholly ignorant of 
their craft are increasingly unwilling to engage one 
who has not passed through a Theological College. 
That the broad result of the training given in 
these seminaries is a general increase in clerical 
efficiency I cannot doubt, but perhaps a layman 
may be permitted to point out some curious gaps 
and lapses in that training which go some way 
towards making clergymen less esteemed, and 
therefore less influential, than they ought to be. 

1. The Clergy are not taught to be courteous. 
If they are courteous by nature and habit, well 
and good ; but a rough Undergraduate, destitute 
of sympathy and tact and ignorant of social usage, 
passes through a Theological College and comes 
out as rough as he entered it. A Bear in Holy 
Orders is as destructive as a Bull in a China 
Shop. 

2. The Clergy are not taught to manage money ; 
they muddle their public accounts ; they beg 
money for one object and use it for another ; they 
seldom acknowledge what they receive by post ; 
and they have absolutely no notion of cutting 
their coat according to their cloth. '' Spend and 



96 SEEING AND HEARING 

beg, and the money will come from somewhere " 
is their simple and sufficient creed. 

3. The Clergy are not taught business. They 
have not the faintest notion of conducting a public 
meeting. They lose their way in the agenda-paper 
of the most insignificant committee. They break 
appointments at their will and pleasure. They 
seldom answer letters, and are frankly astonished 
when their correspondents are annoyed. 

4. The Clergy are not taught the Science of 
Citizenship. Outside their strictly professional 
studies (and, in some cases, the records of athleti- 
cism) they are the most ignorant set of young 
men in the world. They work hard and play 
hard, but they never read. They know nothing 
of books, nothing of history, nothing of the Con- 
stitution under which they live, of the principles 
and records of political parties, of the need for 
social reform or the means of securing it. They 
have a vague but clinging notion that Radicals are 
Infidels, and that Dissenters, if they got their 
deserts, would have their heads punched. 

Sixty years ago an Italian critic said that, in 
spite of all their defects, the English clergy were 
*' Un clero colto e civile." Could as much be said 
to-day ? 



XIV 

PILGRIMAGES 

I USE the word in something wider than Chaucer's 
sense, and yet in a sense not wholly different from 
his. For, though we no longer make an annual 
visit to the Shrine of St. Thomas of Canterbury, 
still we all feel bound, at least once a year, to go 
somewhere and do something quite out of our 
normal course. Perhaps, like Chaucer's friends, 
we ^^ long " to do this in April, but the claims of 
business are generally too strong for us ; so we 
have to content ourselves with admiring the peeps 
of greenery which begin to invade the soot of 
our urban gardens, and, if we are of a cultured 
habit, we can always quote Browning's Thrush or 
strain the kalendar so as to admit Wordsworth's 
Daffodils. 

This notion of a yearly Pilgrimage as a necessity 
of rightly-ordered life seems to have fallen into 
a long abeyance. ^^ Dan Chaucer " (for I love to 
be on easy terms with great men) described the 
social customs of the fourteenth century, and then 
the Pilgrimage seems to have been an established 
institution : *' Tom Hughes " described those of 

97 G 



98 SEEING AND HEARING ^ 

the eighteenth, and this is what, writing in 1862, 
he says about the annual Pilgrimages of his own 
time : — 

^^ I have been credibly informed, and am inclined 
to believe, that the various Boards of Directors of 
Railway Companies agreed together some ten years 
back to buy up the learned profession of Medicine, 
body and soul. To this end they set apart several 
millions of money, which they continually distri- 
bute judiciously among the Doctors, stipulating 
only this one thing — that they shall prescribe 
change of air to every patient who can pay, or 
borrow money to pay, a railway fare, and see 
their prescription carried out. If it be not for 
this, why is it that none of us can be well at 
home for a year together ? It wasn't so twenty 
years ago — not a bit of it. The Browns did not 
go out of the county once in five years." 

The Browns, as we all know, stood in Mr. 
Hughes's vocabulary for the Upper Middle Class 
of England — the class to which the clergy, the 
smaller squires, and the professional men belong ; 
the class which in Chaucer's time contained the 
" Man of Lawe," the *< Marchande," the ^' Frank- 
lyne," and the <^ Doctore of Phisyke " ; and, 
although Mr. Hughes, who ought to know, says 
that in the earlier part of Queen Victoria's reign 
they were a stay-at-home class, they are now the 
most regular and the most zealous of Pilgrims. 
It was the majestic misfortune of the Duke in 



PILGRIMAGES 99 

'^ Lothair " to have so many houses that he had 
no home. People so circumstanced do not need 
to go on Pilgrimages. After the autumn in a 
Scotch Castle, the winter in a country house in the 
Midlands, the spring in another in the Southern 
Counties, and the season in Grosvenor Square, 
people are glad of a little rest, and seek it in 
some ^' proud alcove " on the Thames or a sea-girt 
villa at Cowes. Unless their livers drive them 
to Carlsbad or their hearts to Nauheim, they do 
not travel, but display v^hat Lord Beaconsfield 
called '^ the sustained splendour of their stately 
lives " in the many mansions which, in the aggre- 
gate, represent to them the idea of Home. I 
might perhaps on another occasion sketch the 
Grand Tour of Europe, on which, for educational 
purposes, the Earl of Fitzurse used to send his 
eldest son, young Lord Cubley ; compressed, with 
his tutor and doctor, into a travelling-carriage, 
with a valet and a courier in the rumble. The 
Duke of Argyll's Autobiography has just told us 
what this kind of Pilgrimage was like ; but to-day 
I am dealing with the present rather than the past. 
It is the people with one house who go on 
Pilgrimages nowadays — the impoverished squire, 
the smoke-dried clergyman, the exhausted mer- 
chant, the harried editor. To these must be added 
all the inhabitants, male and female, of Lodging- 
land and Flat-land, — all '' the dim, common 
populations" of Stuccovia and Suburbia. There 



100 SEEING AND HEARING 

are mysterious laws of association which connect 
classes with localities. Tradesmen love Margate ; 
to clerks Scarborough is dear. The Semitic 
financier has long claimed Brighton for his own. 
Costermongers go hop-picking in Kent ; artizans 
disport themselves on the nigger-haunted pier of 
Southend. Governed by some mysterious law of 
their being, schoolmasters make straight for the 
Alps. There they live the strenuous life and brave 
the perilous ascent ; climb and puff and pant all 
day; rush in, very untidy and not very clean, to 
table d'hote ; and season their meal with the '^ shop " 
of St. Winifred's or the gay banter of Rosslyn 
Common-room. It is agreeable to watch the 
forced cordiality, the thin tutorial humour, with 
which they greet some quite irresponsive pupil 
who happens to have strayed into the same hotel ; 
and I have often had occasion to admire the pre- 
cocious dexterity with which the pupil extricates 
himself from this dreaded companionship. Of 
Mr. Gladstone it was said by his detractors that he 
had something of the Schoolmaster in his com- 
position ; and this trait was aptly illustrated when, 
during the summer holidays some fifty years ago, 
he met the late Duchess of Abercorn in a country 
house accompanied by her schoolboy son. Lord 
George Hamilton. Not many mornings had 
elapsed before Mr. Gladstone said to the boy's 
mother, ^* Duchess, don't you think it a pity that 
your son should spend his holidays in entire idle- 



PILGRIMAGES 



lOI 



ness ? I should be happy to give him an hour's 
Homer every morning." The offer was accepted, 
and the foundation of Lord George's lifelong 
hostility to the Liberal leader was securely laid. 
It is the nervous dread of some such awful possi- 
bility which supplies wings to the boy's feet and 
lies to his tongue when he encounters Dr. Grim- 
stone or Basil Warde in a Swiss hotel. 

While the Schoolmaster limits his aspirations to 
the Alps, the Oxford or Cambridge Don, having a 
longer vacation at his command, takes a more 
extended view, and urges his adventurous Pilgrim- 
age along roads less trite. A few years ago an 
Oxford Don resolved to strike out what was then a 
quite new line, and spend his Long Vacation in 
Portugal. Conscious of insufBcient acquaintance 
with the Portuguese language, he repaired to Mr. 
Parker's excellent shop in the Turl and enquired 
for a Portuguese Phrase-book. After some re- 
search, that never-faihng bookseller produced '' The 
New Guide of the Conversation in Portuguese and 
English." The book had an instant and a deserved 
success. The preface sets forth that ^'a choice of 
familiar dialogues, clean of gallicisms and despoiled 
phrases, it was missing yet to studious Portuguese 
and BraziHan youth ; and also to persons of other 
nations that wish to know the Portuguese lan- 
guage." To supply this felt want Pedro Carolino 
compiled his hand-book for ''the acceptation of 
the studious persons, and especially of the Youth, 



102 SEEING AND HEARING 

at which we dedicate him particularly." Among 
those studious persons was our Pilgrim-Don, who 
naturally turned in the first instance to a dialogue 
headed 

"FOR TO TRAVEL 

When do you start ? 

As soon as I shall have to finish a business at 
Cadiz. 

Have you already arrested a coach ? 

Yes, sir, and very cheap. 

Have you great deal of effects ? 

Two trunks and one portmanteau. 

You may prepare all for to-morrow. We shall 
start at the coolness. 

The way, is it good ? 

Very good. 

At which inn shall stop us ? 

In that of the Sun, it is the best. The account 
mount is little. The supper, the bed, and the 
breakfast shall get up at thirty franks. 

That seems to me a little dear." 

The next dialogue follows in the natural 
order : — 

"FOR TO BREAKFAST 

John, bring us some thing for to breakfast. 
Yes, sir ; there is some sausages and some meat 
pies. Will you that I bring the ham ? 



PILGRIMAGES 103 

Yes, bring him, we will cut a steak. 

Put an nappe cloth upon this table. 

Give us some plates, any knifes, and some 
forks, rinse the glasses. 

I have eaten with satisfaction some pudding, 
sausages, and some ham. I shall take some tea. 

Still a not her cup ? 

I thank you it is enough." 

Breakfast over, the traveller engages a guide 
and starts out 

"FOR TO SEE THE TOWN 

We won't to see all that is it remarquable here. 

Come with me, if you please. I shall not folget 
nothing what can to merit your attention. Here 
we are near to cathedraly. Will you come in 
there ? 

We will first go to see him in oudside, after we 
shall go in there for to look the interior." 

A day of sight-seeing concludes happily with 
the ever-welcome dialogue — 

*'FOR TO DINE 

Give us a rice soup. 
What wine do you like best ? 
Bourgogne wine. 

Give us some beef and potatoes, a beefsteak to 
the English. 



104 SEEING AND HEARING 

What you shall take for dessert ? 
Give us some Hollande cheese and some prunes. 
I will take a glass of brandy at the cherries. 
Gentlemen, don't forget the waiter." 

Parsimony is a bond which makes the whole 
world kin, and it is interesting to find em- 
bedded in 182 closely-printed pages of ^'despoiled 
phrases " two such characteristic specimens of 
sound English as ^' That seems to me a little dear " 
and " Don't forget the waiter." 



XV 

THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS 

'^ Gentlemen/' said Dr. Blimber to his pupils on 
the eve of the holidays, ^^ we will resume our 
studies on the twenty-fifth of next month." But 
that adjournment, I think, was for Christmas, and 
we are now in what Matthew Arnold's delicious 
schoolboy called ^^the glad season of sun and 
flowers." Very soon, in Dr. Farrar's romantic 
phrase, ^^the young life which usually plays like 
the sunshine over St. Winifred's will be pouring 
unwonted brightness into many happy English 
homes." Or, to take Mr. Snawley's darker view 
of the same event, we shall be in the thick of one 
of '* those ill-judged comings home twice a year 
that unsettle children's minds so." 

The associations of the moment, so different in 
their effects on different natures, have awoke the 
spirit of prophecy in the late Head Master of 
Eton, Dr. Warre, who, projecting his soul into 
futurity, sees dark days coming for the ^' Public 
Schools " as that phrase has been hitherto under- 
stood. It was clear, said Dr. Warre, after distri- 
buting the prizes at Shrewsbury, *^that ere long 

105 



io6 SEEING AND HEARING 

the Public Schools would have to justify not 
only their curriculum^ but, it might be, their very 
existence. The spirit of the age seemed to be 
inclined towards Utilitarianism, and it was now 
tending to undervalue the humanities and the 
culture that attended them, and to demand what 
it appreciated as a useful and practical training — 
i.e, something capable of making boys bread- 
winners as soon as they left school. He did not 
say that view would ultimately prevail, but the 
trend of public opinion in that direction would 
necessitate on the part of Public Schools a period 
of self-criticism, and very probably a reorganiza- 
tion of curricula. But there was another problem 
to be faced which would become more serious as 
the century waxed older, and that was a new 
phase of competition. As secondary education 
expanded, secondary day-schools would be pro- 
vided regardless of expense, and it was idle to 
think this would have no effect upon great Public 
Schools. What would be weighed in the balance, 
however, was the value of the corporate life and 
aggregate influence of the Public Schools upon 
the formation of character." 

When ex-Head Masters begin to see visions 
and Old Etonians to dream dreams, the ordinary 
citizen, with his traditional belief in the virtue 
and permanence of Public Schools, must rub his 
eyes in astonishment. What is going to happen 
next ? Is Eton to abandon '^ taste " and take to 



THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS 107 

" useful knowledge " ? Is Harrow to close its 
Boarding Houses and become a village Day School 
once more ? Are Wykeham's *' seventy faithful 
boys " (as the late Lord Selborne called them in 
his first attempt at verse) no longer to *' tund " or 
be ^' tunded " ? Is Westminster to forswear its 
Latin Play, and replace the '' Phormio " and the 
^' Trinummus " with ^' Box and Cox " and '* Ici on 
Parle Frangais " ? 

These enquiries, and others like them, are forced 
on our attention by such subversive discourse as 
Dr. Warre's ; and that incursion of rampant boy- 
hood which begins with the beginning of August 
reinforces the eloquence of the ex-Head Master. 
The Retreat of the Ten Thousand, which used to 
worry us in our youth, was not half so formidable 
an affair as the Advance of the Ten Thousand, 
schoolboys though they be, who just now overrun 
the land. There they are, an army ever increas- 
ing in numbers and maintained at an immense 
expense. Whatever commercial and agricultural 
depression may have effected in other quarters, 
it did not touch the schools of England. The 
greater schools are full to overflowing ; provincial 
schools have doubled and trebled their numbers ; 
and every Elizabethan and Edwardian founda- 
tion in the Kingdom has woke from slumber 
and celebrated at least a Tercentenary. And all 
this is not done for nothing. Private school- 
masters take shootings in Scotland ; the pro- 



io8 SEEING AND HEARING 

prietors of Boarding-houses at the Public Schools 
buy villas in the Riviera, and build pineries and 
vineries at home ; meanwhile the British Parent 
eyes his diminishing income and his increasing 
rates, and asks himself, in the secrecy of his own 
heart, what Tommy is really getting in return for 
the ^200 a year expended on his education. The 
answer takes various forms. Perhaps Tommy is 
following the '^ grand, old fortifying classical cur- 
riculum " which sufficed for Lord Lumpington, 
and enabled the Rev. Esau Hittall to compose his 
celebrated ^^ Longs and Shorts on the Calydonian 
Boar." In this case the parent says, with Rawdon 
Crawley, '^ Stick to it, my boy ; there's nothing 
like a good classical education — nothing," but he 
generally is too diffident about his own accom- 
plishments to subject his sons to a very searching 
test. Perhaps one boy in a hundred learns 
enough Latin and Greek at school to fit him for 
a good place in the Classical Tripos or a ^' First 
in Mods." This, if he is meant to be a school- 
master, is a definite and tangible result from his 
father's investment ; if he is intended for any 
other profession the advantage is not so clear. 
If he is to be a Soldier, no doubt there is the 
*' Army Class " or the ^^ Modern School," where, 
indeed, he is exempted from Greek, is taught some 
mathematics, and acquires some very English 
French and German ; but, in spite of these privi- 
leges, he generally requires a year's residence at a 



THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS 109 

crammer's before he has a chance for Sandhurst. 
For the ordinary life of the Professions the Public 
School makes no preparation whatever. Tommy 
may have acquired '^ taste/' but he is no more 
qualified to be, as Dr. Warre says, a ^' bread- 
winner" than he was the day he began school- 
life. 

Matthew Arnold, in his delightful essay on '^ An 
Eton Boy," says, with regard to that boy's prowess 
as Master of the Beagles : — 

"The aged Barbarian will, upon this, admir- 
ingly mumble to us his story how the Battle of 
Waterloo was won in the Playing Fields of Eton. 
Alas ! disasters have been prepared in those Play- 
ing Fields as well as victories — disasters due to an 
inadequate mental training, to want of application, 
knowledge, intelligence, lucidity." 

With " taste " we commonly hear " tone " com- 
bined in the eulogies of Public Schools. The 
Parent, who knows (though he would not for the 
world admit) that Tommy has learnt nothing at 
St. Winifred's or Rosslyn which will ever enable 
him to earn a penny, falls back upon the impalpable 
consolation that there is " a very nice tone about 
the school." Certainly Eton imparts manners to 
those who have not acquired them at home, and 
in this respect Radley is like unto it. But, taking 
the Public Schools as a whole, it can scarcely be 
denied that, however faithfully they cultivate the 
ingenuous arts, they suffer Youth to be extremely 



no SEEING AND HEARING 

brutal. If this be urged, the Parent will shift his 
ground and say, ^' Well, I Hke boys to be natural. 
I don't wish my son to be a Lord Chesterfield. 
Character is everything. It is the religious and 
moral influence of a Public School that I think so 
valuable." As to the Religion taught in Public 
Schools, it is, as Mr. T. E. Page of Charterhouse 
recently said with artless candour, exactly the 
same commodity as will probably be offered by 
the County Councils when the Education Bill has 
become law ; and it is worth noting that, though 
Bishops shrink with horror at the prospect of this 
religion being offered to the poor, they are per- 
fectly content that it should be crammed down 
the throats of their own sons. As to the morality 
acquired at Public Schools, a clergyman who was 
successively an Eton boy and an Eton master 
wrote twenty-five years ago : " The masters of many 
schools are sitting on a volcano, which, when it 
explodes, will fill with horror and alarm those who 
do not know what boys' schools are, or knowing 
it, shut their eyes and stop their ears." It must be 
admitted that the British Parent, dwelling on the 
slopes of that volcano, regards its chronic menace 
and its periodical activities with the most singular 
composure. 

In years gone by Harrow, like most other places 
where there was a Public School accessible to day 
boys, was a favourite resort of widowed ladies 
whose husbands had served in the Indian Army 



THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS 



III 



or Civil Service. These ^' Indian Widows/' as he 
called them, so pestered Dr. Vaughan, then Head 
Master, that he said in the bitterness of his soul : 
'' Before I came to Harrow I thought ' Suttee ' an 
abomination ; but now I see that there is a great 
deal to be said for it/' It is easy enough to see 
why Head Masters dislike the Home Boarding 
system. It defeats the curious policy by which 
assistant masters pay themselves out of their 
boarders' stomachs, and it brings all the arrange- 
ments of teaching and discipline under the survey, 
and perhaps criticism, of the parents ; but, in spite 
of magisterial objections, the Home Boarding sys- 
tem is probably the only and certainly the most 
efficacious method of coping with those moral 
evils which all schoolmasters not wilfully blind 
acknowledge, and which the best of them strenu- 
ously combat. In that extension of Day Schools 
which Dr. Warre foresees lies the best hope of a 
higher tone in public education. 

The British Parent knows the weaknesses of the 
Public School system. He knows that he gets a 

very doubtful return for his money that his son 

learns nothing useful and very little that is orna- 
mental ; is unsuitably fed, and, when ill, insuffi- 
ciently attended ; exposed to moral risks of a very 
grave type ; and withdrawn at the most impressible 
season of life from the sanctifying influences of 
Motherhood and Home. He knows all this, and, 
knowing it, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred 



112 SEEING AND HEARING 

he sends all his boys to a Public School. Why ? 
Partly because every one goes to a Public School 
and he has no wish to be eccentric or faddish ; 
partly because the boys are tiresome at home and 
he wants peace ; partly because, in existing con- 
ditions, he does not know how to get them edu- 
cated while they are under his roof. But the 
strongest reason is none of these. He sends his 
sons to Eton or Harrow because he was there 
himself, has felt the glamour and learnt the spell ; 
because some of his happiest memories hover 
round the Playing Fields or the Hill ; because 
there he first knew what Friendship meant and 
first tasted the Romance of Life. 

" I may have failed, my School may fail ; 
I tremble, but thus much I dare : 
I love her. Let the critics rail, 

My brethren and my home are there." 



XVI 

SCHOOLS AND BOARDING-HOUSES 

*' Any two meals at a Boarding-Hoiise are to- 
gether less than one square meal." This pleasing 
postulate was, I believe, in the first instance 
evolved from the bitter experience of a hungry 
mathematician who, at this season of the year, 
sought change of air and scene at Margate or 
Heme Bay. But to-day I use the word ^^ Board- 
ing-House" in that more restricted sense which 
signifies a Master's house for the accommodation 
of boys at a Public School. My reason for dis- 
cussing the subject is that a stray sentence in 
my last chapter, about the profits derived from 
such Boarding- Houses, caused dire offence. I 
am the most docile creature alive, and the re- 
bukes which I have incurred caused me, as the 
French say, to make a return upon myself. I 
subjected my conscience to severe cross-examina- 
tion. I asked whether what I had written was 
wholly or even approximately true, or entirely 
false ; and whether, if true, it was offensive or 
indelicate. Here is the sentence in all its un- 
glossed brutality: ^^The proprietors of Boarding- 

"3 H 



114 SEEING AND HEARING 

Houses at the Public Schools buy villas in the 
Riviera and build pineries and vineries at home." 
Now, of course, a Schoolmaster is nothing if not 
critical, and, in superintending the studies of his 
young friends, he rightly insists on the most 
scrupulous accuracy of phrase and figure. Not 
for the construing boy is the plea, dear to Biblical 
critics, that '^the wider divergence is the higher 
unity." The calculating boy must not, if he 
values his peace, mistake inference for demonstra- 
tion. Woe betide the excuse-making boy if he 
protests that he has spent an hour over his lesson 
when his tutor can show that he could only have 
spent fifty-five minutes. This Chinese exactness 
is all very well in the schoolroom, but tends to 
become a bore in the intercourse of social life. 
An Assistant Master, stung into activity by my 
recent strictures on Public Schools, has swooped 
down upon me with all the fierce alacrity which 
he would display in detecting a false quantity or 
an erroneous deduction. ^^ Villas in the Riviera ! 
Who buys Villas in the Riviera ? Give, name, 
date, and place by return of post, or — write out 
five hundred lines." " What do you mean by 
Pineries and Vineries ? I and my colleagues at 
St. Winifred's only grow cucumbers ; and the 
Composition-Master, though he has large private 
means, gets his grapes from the Stores. Retract 
and apologize, or be for ever fallen." 

Now really, when I read all this virtuous indig- 



SCHOOLS AND BOARDING-HOUSES 115 

nation, I am irresistibly reminded of the Bishop in 
" Little Dorrit/' who, when all the guests were ex- 
tolling Mr. Merdle's wealth, spoke pensively about 
" the goods of this world," and '' tried to look as 
if he were rather poor himself." In vain I pro- 
tested that I meant no injurious allusion to Monte 
Carlo, and proposed to substitute '' Mansions in 
the Isle of Wight" for ^'Villas in the Riviera." 
The substitution availed me nothing. *^ You say 
* Mansions.' Do you really know more than one ? 
And how do you know that the schoolmaster who 
bought it did not marry a wife with a fortune ? 
You cannot investigate his marriage settlements, 
so your illustration counts for nothing." In the 
same conciliatory spirit, I urged that " Pineries and 
Vineries " was a picturesque phrase invented by 
Lord Randolph Churchill to describe the amenities 
of a comfortable country house, not of the largest 
order ; but my pedagogue was not to be pacified. 
" If you didn't mean Pineries and Vineries, you 
shouldn't have said so. It creates a bad impres- 
sion in the parents' minds. Of course no reason- 
able person could object to one's having gardens, 
or stabling, or a moderate shooting, or a share of 
a salmon river ; but parents don't like the notion 
that we are living in luxury. They have a nasty 
way of contrasting it with the nonsense which 
their boys tell them about tough meat and rancid 
butter." 

At this point I began to see some resemblance 



ii6 SEEING AND HEARING 

between my correspondent and Matthew Arnold's 
critic in the Quarterly of October 1868 — "one 
of the Eton Under-Masters, who, like Demetrius 
the Silversmith, seems alarmed for the gains of his 
occupation." For, in spite of all corrections and 
deductions, I cannot help regarding Public School- 
masters as a well-paid race. Of course, it is true 
that their incomes are not comparable to those of 
successful barristers or surgeons, or even Ministers 
of State ; but, on the other side, their work is 
infinitely easier ; their earnings begin from the 
day on which they embark on their profession ; 
and no revolution of the wheel of State can shake 
them from their well-cushioned seats. I am quite 
willing to admit that, on the figures supplied by 
my correspondent, he and his colleagues at St. 
Winifred's are not making so much money as their 
predecessors made twenty or thirty years ago. 
But, as far as I can understand, this diminution of 
incomes does not arise from diminution of charges, 
but only from the fact that the force of public 
opinion has driven schoolmasters to recognize, 
rather more fully than in days gone by, some 
primary needs of boy-nature. When the Royal 
Commission of 1862 was enquiring into the board- 
ing arrangements of a famous school, one of the 
Commissioners was astonished to find that, in spite 
of the liberal charge for board, the boys got 
nothing but tea and bread and butter for breakfast. 
Apparently wishing to let the masters down easy, 



SCHOOLS AND BOARDING-HOUSES 117 

he suggested that perhaps eggs also were provided. 
To this suggestion the witness's answer was monu- 
mental : ^^ Eggs, indeed, are not provided, but in 
some houses a large machine for boiling eggs is 
brought in every day ; so that, if the boys bring 
their eggs, they are boiled for them." Surely the 
Master who first conceived this substitution of hard- 
ware for food deserved a permanent place among 
Social Economists ; but ** the bigots of this iron 
time," though they may not actually '' have called 
his harmless art a crime," have resolved that, 
when a father pays ;^2 00 a year for his boy's 
schooling, the boy shall have something more 
substantial than bread and butter for breakfast. 
This reform alone, according to my correspondent, 
knocked some hundreds a year off each House- 
Master's income. 

Then, again, as regards Sanitation. Here, 
certainly not before it was wanted, reform has 
made its appearance, and the injured House- 
Master has had to put his hand in his pocket. 
When I was at a Public School, in that Golden 
Age of Profits to which my correspondent looked 
back so wistfully, the sanitary arrangements were 
such as to defy description and stagger behef. 
In one Pupil-Room there was only the thickness 
of the boarded floor between the cesspool and 
the feet of the boys as they sat at lessons. In 
my own house, containing forty boarders, there 
were only two baths. In another, three and even 



ii8 SEEING AND HEARING 

four boys were cooped together, by day as well 
as by night, in what would, in an ordinary house, 
be regarded as a smallish bedroom. Now all 
this is changed. Drainage is reconstructed ; baths 
are multiplied ; to each boy is secured a sufficient 
air-space at lessons and in sleep. The Sanitary 
Engineer is let loose every term — 

" What pipes and air-shafts ! What wild ecstasy ! " 

But the '^ ecstasy " is confined to the bosom of the 
Engineer as he draws up his little account, and the 
House-Master moans, like Mr. Mantalini, over the 
'' Demnition Total." 

Yet another such deduction must be borne in 
mind. Volumes of nonsense have been written 
about the Fagging System. Sentimental writers 
have gushed over the beautiful relation which it 
establishes between Fag-Master and Fag. Some, 
greatly daring, have likened it to the relation 
of elder and younger brothers. Others, more 
historically minded, have tried to connect it with 
the usages of Chivalry and the services rendered 
by the Page to the Knight. As a matter of fact,, 
it was, as ^' Jacob Omnium," himself an Old 
Etonian, pointed out fifty years ago, ^^ an affair of 
the breeches pocket." As long as younger boys 
could be compelled (by whatever methods) to 
clean lamps and brush clothes and toast sausages 
and fill tubs for elder boys it was obvious that 
fewer servants were required. One of the most 



SCHOOLS AND BOARDING-HOUSES 119 

brilliant Etonians now living has said that ^' to see 
a little boy performing; with infinite pains and 
hopeless inadequacy, the functions of a domestic 
servant, might have moved Democritus to tears 
and Heraclitus to laughter." That Fagging has 
its uses, more especially in the case of spoilt boys 
brought up in purse-proud homes, few Public 
Schoolmen will deny ; but the British Parent 
tends increasingly to draw a distinction between 
the duties of a fag and those of a footman ; and 
the wages-bill becomes an increasingly important 
item in the House-Master's expenditure. 

What, then, is the conclusion of the whole 
matter ? It is, as I have repeatedly said, that 
a Boarding-School, whether public or private, is 
not the ideal method of educating boys ; but, 
pending that great increase of Day-Schools for the 
sons of the upper classes which Dr. Warre fore- 
sees, it is the only method practically available for 
the great majority of English parents. Whether 
the instruction imparted in the Public Schools is 
or is not worth the amount which it costs is a 
matter of opinion ; and, indeed, as long as the 
parent (who, after all, has to pay) is satisfied, 
no one else need trouble himself about the ques- 
tion. As to domestic arrangements and provision 
for health and comfort, it may be frankly con- 
ceded that the Schoolboy of to-day is much better 
off than his father or even his elder brother was ; 
and that the improvements in his lot have tended 



I20 SEEING AND HEARING 

to diminish the profits on which the House-Master 
used to grow rich. 



P.S. — Having the terrors of the ferule before 
my eyes, let me hasten to say, with all possible 
explicitness, that in my account of my correspon- 
dence with the outraged Schoolmaster, I have 
aimed at giving a general impression rather than a 
verbal transcript. 



XVII 

SQUARES 

All true lovers of Lewis Carroll will remember 

that Hiawatha, when he went a-photographing, 

'* pulled and pushed the joints and hinges " of his 

Camera, 

" Till it looked all squares and oblongs, 
Like a complicated figure 
In the Second Book of Euclid." 

But it is not of squares in the mathematical sense 
that I speak to-day, but rather of those enclosed 
spaces, most irregularly shaped and proportioned, 
which go by the name of *' Squares " in London. 

It is in sultry August that the value of these 
spaces is most clearly perceived ; for now the 
better-disposed owners fling open the gates of 
their squares and suffer them to become, at least 
temporarily, the resting-places of the aged and 
decrepit, and the playgrounds of the children. 
To extend these benefits more widely and to secure 
them in perpetuity are objects for which civic 
reformers have long striven ; and during the 
present session of Parliament^ (for, as Dryasdust 
would remind us. Parliament is not prorogued 

^ August 1906. 



122 SEEING AND HEARING 

but only adjourned) two Acts have been passed 
which may do something at least towards attaining 
the desired ends. One of these Acts provides 
that, in cases where ^^ Open Spaces and Burial 
Grounds " are vested in Trustees, the Trustees 
may transfer them to the Local Authorities, to be 
maintained for the use and service of the public. 
The other forbids for all time the erection of 
buildings on certain squares and gardens which 
belong to private owners, those owners having 
consented to this curtailment of their powers. 
The conjunction of '^ Burial Grounds " with ^^ Open 
Spaces" in the purview of the former Act has a 
rather lugubrious sound ; but in reality it points 
to one of the happiest changes which recent years 
have brought to London. 

*' A hemmed-in churchyard, pestiferous and ob- 
scene, whence malignant diseases are communi- 
cated to the bodies of our dear brothers and sisters 
who have not departed — here, in a beastly scrap 
of ground which a Turk would reject as a savage 
abomination and a Caf¥re would shudder at, they 
bring * our dear brother here departed ' to receive 
Christian burial. With houses looking on, on 
every side, save where a reeking little tunnel of a 
court gives access to the iron gate — with every 
villainy of life in action close on death and every 
poisonous element of death in action close on life, 
— here they lower our dear brother down a foot 
or two ; here sow him in corruption, to be raised 



SQUARES 123 

in corruption ; an avenging ghost at many a sick- 
beside ; a shameful testimony to future ages that 
civilization and barbarism walked this boastful 
island together." 

When Dickens wrote that hideous description, 
worthy to be illustrated by Hogarth in his most 
realistic mood, he did not exaggerate — he could 
not exaggerate — the obscenity of burial-grounds 
in crowded cities. To-day they are green with 
turf and bright with flowers, and brighter still 
with the unconquerable merriment of childhood at 
play among the dim memorials of the forgotten 
dead. What is true of the particular spot which 
Dickens described is true all over London ; and 
the resting-places of the departed have been made 
oases of life and health in this arid wilderness of 
struggling and stifled humanity. 

Though so much has been done in the way 
of making the Churchyards available for public 
uses, comparatively little has been done with the 
Squares ; and philosophers of the school erro- 
neously called Cynical might account for this 
difference by the fact that, whereas the church- 
yards were generally in the hands of official 
trustees, such as Rectors, Churchwardens, Over- 
seers, or Vestries, the principal squares of London 
are the private property of individual owners. 
Even the London Squares and Enclosures Act, 
just passed, illustrates the same principle. The 
preamble of the Act sets forth that in respect of 



124 SEEING AND HEARING 

every Square or Enclosure with which it deals the 
consent of the owner has been obtained. In each 
case, therefore, the owner has consented to legisla- 
tion which will prevent himself or his successors 
from building on what are now open spaces, and, 
so far, each owner concerned has shown himself 
a patriotic citizen and a well-wisher to posterity. 
But, when we come to examine the schedule of 
properties to which the Act applies, it is interesting 
to compare the number belonging to private per- 
sons with the number belonging to public bodies. 
The Act applies to sixty-four properties ; of these 
fifty-five belong to public bodies such as District 
Councils, Governors of Hospitals, and Ecclesiasti- 
cal Commissioners, and nine to private persons, 
among whom it is pleasant to reckon one Liberal 
M.P., Sir John Dickson-Poynder, and, by way of 
balance, one Conservative peer, Lord Camden. 

A further study of the Schedule reveals the 
instructive fact that, with two exceptions in the 
City of Westminster and one in the Borough of 
Kensington, none of the scheduled properties lie 
within areas which could by any stretch of terms 
be called wealthy, fashionable, or aristocratic. 
Public authorities in such districts as Camberwell 
and Lewisham — private owners in Islington and 
Woolwich — have willingly surrendered their rights 
for the benefit of the community ; but none of the 
great ground landlords have followed suit. The 
owners of Belgrave Square and Grosvenor Square 



SQUARES 125 

and Portman Square and Cavendish Square and 
Berkeley Square — the Squares, par excellencey of 
fashionable London — have kept their seigniorial 
rights untouched. Pascal told us of some very 
human but very unregenerate children who said 
^* This dog belongs to mcy" and " That place in the 
sun is Mine," 7xn& Pascal's comment was, '^Behold, 
the beginning and the image of all usurpation 
upon earth ! " Similarly, the human but unre- 
generate landowners of fashionable London say, 
as they survey their possessions, ^< This Square 
belongs to me,' ^' That place in the shade is Mine" 
while the August sun beats down on the malodor- 
ous street, and tottering paupers peer wistfully at 
the benches under the plane trees, and street-boys 
flatten their noses against the iron railings and 
madly yearn for cricket-pitches so smooth and 
green. 

Although these fashionable Squares are so 
sedulously guarded against the intrusion of out- 
siders, they are very little used by those who have 
the right of entrance. ^' Livery Servants and 
Dogs not admitted " is a legendary inscription 
which, in its substance, still operates. Here and 
there a nurse with a baby in her arms haunts the 
shade, or a parcel of older children play lawn- 
tennis or croquet to an accompaniment of chaff 
from envious street-boys. But, as a general rule, 
for twenty hours out of the twenty-four and for 
ten months out of the twelve the Squares are 



126 SEEING AND HEARING 

absolutely vacant ; and one of the most reasonable 
reforms which I could conceive would be to con- 
vert them from private pleasure-grounds to public 
gardens, and to throw the cost of maintaining 
them in order and beauty on the London County 
Council. 

As I said before, some Square-owners have, 
without waiting for legal compulsion, taken tenta- 
tive steps towards this reform. The Trustees of 
Lincoln's Inn Fields, the largest and the shadiest 
of all London Squares, have made them over to 
the County Council, and, in the hot months of 
declining summer, the juvenile populations of Hol- 
born and St. Giles play their breathless games 
where Babington was hanged and Russell beheaded. 
It was there that, on the 20th of July 1683, Sir 
Ralph Verney, riding out from London to his 
home in Buckinghamshire, " saw the scaffold 
making ready against Lord Russell's execution to- 
morrow — God help him, and save the country." 

But if once we leave the utilities and amenities 
of the London Squares and begin to meddle with 
their antiquities, we shall soon overflow all reason- 
able limits. Bloomsbury Square still reeks (at 
least for those who know their ^' Barnaby Rudge ") 
with the blood which was shed in the Gordon 
Riots. Grosvenor Square — the last district of 
London which clung to oil-lamps in hopeless re- 
sistance to the innovation of gas — embodies the 
more recent memory of the Cato Street Con- 



SQUARES 127 

spiracy. In Berkeley Square (from what is now 
Lord Rosebery's house) Sarah Child eloped, and 
annexed the name and the banking-house of Child 
to the Earldom of Jersey. In Portman Square 
Mrs. Montagu presided over her court of Blue- 
stockings and feasted the chimney-sweeps on 
May-day. In Manchester Square, under the roof 
which now houses the Wallace Collection, the 
dazzling beauty of Isabella Lady Hertford stirred 
the fatuous passion of George IV. In Cavendish 
Square, under the portico of Harcourt House, 
lately demolished, Disraeli said good-bye for 
ever to his confederate Lord George Bentinck. 
In Hanover Square, Chantrey's stately statue of 
William Pitt has looked down on a century of 
aristocratic weddings, ascending and descending 
the steps of St. George's Church. Sir George 
Trevelyan, commenting on a Valentine written 
by Macaulay for Lady Mary Stanhope, a great- 
niece of Pitt's, declares that ''the allusion to the 
statue in Hanover Square is one of the happiest 
touches that can be found in Macaulay's writings," 
and that is a sufBcient justification for quoting it : — 

" Prophetic rage my bosom swells ; 
I taste the cake, I hear the bells ! 
From Conduit Street the close array 
Of chariots barricades the way 
To where I see, with outstretched hand, 
Majestic, thy great kinsman stand, 
And half unbend his brow of pride, 
As welcoming so fair a bride." 



XVIII 

SUNDAY IN LONDON 

It is the middle of August, and there is nobody 
in London — except, of course, some four millions 
of people who do not count. There is nobody 
in London ; and, most specially and noticeably, 
there is nobody in Church. Be it far from me to 
suggest that the Country Cousin and the Trans- 
atlantic Brother, who flood London in August 
and September, are persons of indevout habits. 
But they have their own methods and places of 
devotion (of which I may speak anon), and do 
not affect the Parish Churches, with which I am 
now concerned. I have excellent opportunities of 
judging ; for, year in year out, in tropical heat or 
Arctic cold, my due feet never fail to walk the 
round of our Stuccovian churches, and I can 
testify that in August and September Vacancy 
and Depression reign unchallenged. Seats are 
empty. Galleries are locked. Collections sink 
to vanishing-point. The Vicar of St. Ursula's, 
Stucco Gardens, accompanied by his second wife, 
is sitting under a white umbrella at Dieppe, watch- 
ing the aquatic gambols of his twofold family. 

128 



SUNDAY IN LONDON 129 

The Senior Curate is climbing in the Alps. 
The Junior Curate, who stroked his College Boat 
last year and was ordained at Trinity, officiates 
in agonies of self-conscious shyness which would 
draw tears from a stone. A temporary organist 
elicits undreamt-of harmonies. The organ-blower 
is getting his health in the hopfields. The choir- 
boys are let loose — 

'* On Brighton's shingly beach, on Margate's sand, 
Their voice out-pipes the roaring of the sea." 

The congregation represents the mere dregs 
and remnants of Stuccovia's social prime. Poor 
we have none, and our rich are fled to Scotland 
or Norway, Homburg or Marienbad. The seats 
are sparsely tenanted by '^stern-faced men" (like 
those who arrested Eugene Aram), whom business 
keeps in London when their hearts are on the 
moors ; over-burdened mothers, with herds of 
restless schoolboys at home for the holidays and 
craving for more ardent delights than Stucco 
Gardens yield ; decayed spinsters of the type of 
Volumnia Dedlock, who, having exhausted the 
hospitable patience of their ever-diminishing band 
of friends, are forced to the horrid necessity of 
spending the autumn in London. The only 
cheerful face in the church belongs to the Pew- 
opener, who, being impeded in the discharge of 
her function by arthritic rheumatism, is happiest 
when congregations are smallest and there are no 

I 



130 SEEING AND HEARING 

week-day services to ^'molest her ancient solitary 
reign." 



Evensong is over. The organist is struggling 
with an inconceivable tune from ^' The English 
Hymnal " (for at St. Ursula's we are nothing if not 
up to date). The Curate, sicklied o'er with that 
indescribable horror which in his boating days 
he would have described as ^^The Needle," is 
furtively reperusing his manuscript before mount- 
ing the pulpit, and does not detect my craven 
flight as I slip through the baize door and dis- 
appear. It is characteristic of St. Ursula's that, 
even when empty, it is fusty ; but this need 
surprise no one, for the architect was strong on a 
** scientific system of ventilation," and that, as we 
all know, means very little ventilation and an 
overwhelming amount of system. 

However, my courageous flight has delivered 
me from asphyxiation, and, before returning to 
my modest Sunday supper of Paysandu Ox-tongue 
and sardines, I think that I will reinflate my lungs 
by a stroll round Hyde Park. There is a lovely 
redness in the western sky over the Serpentine 
Bridge, but it is still broad daylight. The sere 
and yellow turf of the Park is covered by some of 
those four millions who do not count and do not 
go to church, but who, apparently, are fond of 
sermons. At the end of each hundred yards I 



SUNDAY IN LONDON 131 

come upon a preacher of some religious, social, 
or political gospel, and round each is gathered a 
crowd of listeners who follow his utterances with 
interested attention. When I think of St. Ursula's 
and the pavid Curate and my graceless flight, I 
protest that I am covered with shame as with a 
garment. But the wrong done in the church 
can be repaired in the Park. I have missed one 
sermon, but I will hear another. Unluckily, when 
these compunctious visitings seized me I was 
standing by a rostrum of heterodoxy. For all I 
know the preacher may have followers among my 
readers ; so, as I would not for the world wound 
even the least orthodox susceptibilities, I forbear 
to indicate the theory which he enounced. As he 
spoke, I seemed to, live a former life over again ; 
for I had once before been present at an exactly 
similar preaching, in company, either bodily or 
spiritual, with my friend Mr. James Payn, and his 
comments on the scene revived themselves in 
my memory, even as the remote associations of 
Ellangowan reawoke in the consciousness of Harry 
Bertram when he returned from his wanderings, 
and gazed, bewildered, on his forgotten home. 
(Henceforward it is Payn that speaks.) The 
preacher of Heterodoxy was entirely without 
enthusiasm, nor did his oratory borrow any 
meretricious attractions from the Muse. It was 
a curious farrago of logic without reason and 
premisses without facts, and was certainly the 



132 SEEING AND HEARING 

least popular, though not the least numerously 
attended; of all the competing sermons in the 
Park. Suddenly the preacher gave expression to 
a statement more monstrous than common, on 
which an old lady in the crowd, who had hereto- 
fore been listening with great complacency, ex- 
claimed in horror, ^' I'm sure this ain't true Gospel," 
and immediately decamped. Up to that point, she 
had apparently been listening under the impression 
that the preacher belonged to her own blameless 
persuasion, and was in the blankest ignorance of 
all that he had been driving at. 

But Sunday in London has religious attractions 
to offer besides those purveyed by St. Ursula's 
and Hyde Park. I said at the outset that the 
Country Cousin and the Transatlantic Brother 
have their own methods and places of devotion 
— their Mecca is St. Paul's Cathedral. One of 
the pleasantest ways of spending a Sunday evening 
in London is to join the pilgrim-throng. The 
great west doors of the Cathedral are flung wide 
open, as if to welcome the Archbishop of Canter- 
bury or the Lord Mayor, and all at once we find 
ourselves, hushed and awestruck, in the illimit- 
able perspective. Even the staunchest believer 
in Gothic as the only religious architecture may 
admit, with disloyalty to his faith, that every year 
St. Paul's becomes more like a place of Christian 
worship and less like a glorified Council-hall or 
an Imperial Senate-house. And it is seen at its 



SUNDAY IN LONDON 133 

best in twilight. The shadows temper the garish 
splendour of mosaic and gold and electricity, and 
enhance the dominant sense of vastness and 
grandeur. And prayer ascends on the wings of 
music and sweet boy-voices ring, and the distant 
altar, with its gleaming lights, focuses the meaning 
and purpose of the whole. And then the great 
^' Communion of Hymns " unites us all, American 
and English, Londoner and countryman, as citi- 
zens of a city not built with hands, patriots of a 
country which is not marked on the terrestrial 
globe. Bernard of Cluny and William Cowper and 
John Keble all contribute of their best. '' Brief 
life is here our portion " seems to utter the real 
heart's desire of a tired-looking mechanic who 
stands by my side. *' Hark, my soul ! " seems to 
communicate its own intensity to the very tone 
and look of the people who are singing it. ^' Sun 
of my soul " is an evening prayer which sounds 
just as natural and as fitting in the inmost heart 
of London's crowd and grind and pressure as in 
the sweet solitude of the Hursley fields. In the 
pulpit a pale preacher, himself half worn-out 
before his prime by ten years' battle in a slum, is 
extolling the Cross as the test and strength and 
glory of human life — 

" While at his feet the human ocean lay, 
And wave on wave rolled into space away." 

A human stream indeed, of all sorts and conditions 



134 SEEING AND HEARING 

— old men and maidens, young men and children, 
rich and poor, English and foreigners, sightseers 
and citizens, dapper clerks and toil-stained citizens 
and red-coated soldiers — all interested, and all at 
ease, and all at home at what Bishop Lightfoot 
called '^ the centre of the world's concourse " — 
under the cross-crowned Dome of St. Paul's. 



\ 



XIX 

A SUBURBAN SUNDAY 

^^ It seems to the writer of this history that the 
inhabitants of London are scarcely sufBciently 
sensible of the beauty of its environs. . . . With 
the exception of Constantinople, there is no city 
in the world that can for a moment enter into 
competition with it. For himself, though in his 
time something of a rambler, he is not ashamed 
in this respect to confess to a legitimate Cockney 
taste ; and for his part he does not know where 
life can flow on more pleasantly than in sight of 
Kensington Gardens, viewing the silver Thames 
winding by the bowers of Rosebank, or inhaling 
from its terraces the refined air of graceful Rich- 
mond. In exactly ten minutes it is in the power 
of every man to free himself from all the tumult 
of the world and find himself in a sublime sylvan 
solitude superior to the Cedars of Lebanon and 
inferior only in extent to the chestnut forests of 
Anatolia." 

The judicious critic will have little difficulty in 
assigning this vivid passage to the too-graphic pen 

of Lord Beaconsfield ; but he will also recognize 

135 



136 SEEING AND HEARING 

the fact that a description written in 1837 needs 
some modification when applied to 1906. The 
central solitude of London — Kensington Gardens 
— is still very much as it was. Just now, its dark 
foliage and dusky glades suggest all the romantic 
associations of Gustave Dore's forests, with a tall 
trooper of the Life Guards and a bashful nursery- 
maid, for a Red Cross Knight and an Enchanted 
Princess. If we go further afield and climb the up- 
lands of Highgate and Hampstead, we look down 
upon a boundless and beautiful city dimly visible 
through a golden haze. But the difference be- 
tween the environs of London now and the same 
environs when Lord Beaconsfield described them 
is that they are now united to the centre by an 
unbroken network of gaslit streets. The enormous 
increase in the population of London, which every 
year brings with it, fills up the gaps and spaces, 
and the metropolis is now a solid whole, with its 
circumference extending further and further every 
day into what a year ago was country. In other 
words, the suburbs are getting further off, and 
what are suburbs to-day will be town to-morrow ; 
but still there are suburbs, and a Sunday spent 
in them is an interesting experience. 

Yesterday the well - known stuffiness of St. 
Ursula's, combined with the kind hospitality of 
some suburban friends, drove me to spend my 
Sunday about ten miles from Stucco Square. It 
is a characteristic of people who live in suburbs 



A SUBURBAN SUNDAY 137 

to believe that their lot is cast in a primaeval 
solitude; and that, though the Dome of St. Paul's 
is plainly visible from their back gardens, the 
traveller who ventures to approach them needs 
explicit and intricate directions about routes and 
trains and changes and stations. The station for 
my friend's place was called by a name intensely 
suggestive of rurality — not exactly ^^ Rosebank/' 
but Rosebank will serve. Readers of Archbishop 
Temple's Life will remember that a clergyman, 
excusing himself for living a long way from his 
church, urged that it was only three miles as the 
crow flies, thereby drawing down on himself the 
implacable reply, '^ But you ain't a crow." In 
the same way I found that, though Rosebank is 
onlyi ten miles from Stucco Square '^ as the crow 
flies," a human being seeking to approach it must 
first make a considerable journey to a central 
terminus, must then embark in a train which a 
tortoise might outstrip, must change twice, and 
must burrow through a sulphurous tunnel ; and 
must even then run a considerable risk of being 
carried through Rosebank Station, which all self- 
respecting trains seem to ignore. 

Faced by these difficulties, I again took counsel 
with Lord Beaconsfield. ^^ ' 'Tis the gondola of 
London,' exclaimed Lothair, as he leapt into a 
hansom, which he had previously observed to be 
well-horsed." My Gondolier was ready with his 
terms — a very liberal payment, several hours' rest, 



138 SEEING AND HEARING 

his dinner and tea, and something extra for 
putting up his horse. Granted these prelimina- 
ries; he would '^ do the job on 'is 'ead." It would 
^' be a little 'oliday to 'im." I in vain suggested 
that the opportunity of attending Divine Service 
twice at Rosebank Church might be regarded as 
part payment of his charge ; he replied, with 
startling emphasis, that he didn't go into the 
country to go to church — not if he knew it ; that, 
if I wanted him, I must take him on the terms 
proposed ; and, further, that I mustn't mind 
starting early, for he wanted to get his horse down 
cool. 

The Gondolier had his own way ; and, while the 
sparrows were still twittering and the housemaids 
were taking in the milk and the Sunday paper, 
I was well on my road to Rosebank. This much 
I will concede to the curiosity of readers — that 
my road led me out of London in a south-easterly 
direction, by the Horseferry, where James II. 
dropped the Great Seal into the Thames, along the 
Old Kent Road, of which a modern minstrel sang ; 
past Kennington Common, now a '' Park," where 
the gallant Jacobites of '45 underwent the hideous 
doom of Treason, where the iron-shuttered windows 
still commemorate the Chartist rising of '48, and 
where Sackville Maine took his Sunday walk with 
Mrs. Sackville and old Mrs. Chuff. On past the 
^^ Hamlet of Dulwich," where Mr. Pickwick spent 
the last years of his honoured life, to Chislehurst, 



A SUBURBAN SUNDAY 139 

where Napoleon III. hid his exiled head, and 
North Cray; where the tragedy of Lord London- 
derry's death is not yet forgotten, and Shooters' 
Hill, where Jerry Cruncher stopped the coach 
with the terrifying message of ^' Recalled to Life." 
Now, as readers are sometimes unduly literal, and 
as I would not willingly involve any one in an 
hour's fruitless puzzling over a map, let me say 
that this itinerary is rather general than particular, 
and that, although the Gondolier pursued an ex- 
tremely devious course and murmured when I 
suggested straighter paths, we did not touch all 
the above-mentioned places in our morning's 
drive. But evermore we tended south-eastwards, 
and evermore the houses grew imperceptibly less 
dignified. Stone and stucco we had left behind 
us on the northern side of the river, and now it 
was a boundless contiguity of brick — yellow brick, 
rather grimy, — small houses with porticos, slips 
of dusty garden between the front door and the 
road, and here and there a row of wayside trees. 
But everywhere gas, and everywhere omnibi (as 
the classical lady said,) and everywhere electric 
trams. Churches of every confession and every 
architecture lined the way, varied with Public- 
houses of many signs. Municipal Buildings of 
startling splendour (for Borough Councils have a 
flamboyant taste), and Swimming Baths and Public 
Libraries, and here and there a private Lunatic 
Asylum frowning behind suggestively solemn gates. 



140 SEEING AND HEARING 

Now we are in a long and featureless street, 
with semi-detached houses on either hand, and 
a malodorous cab-stand and a four-faced clock. 
^* Which way for Rosebank ? " shouts the Gondo- 
lier. ^'The first to your left and then turn sharp 
to the right/' bellows a responsive policeman. We 
follow the direction given, and suddenly we are there 
— not at Rosebank, but quite out of even Greater 
London. The street ends abruptly. Trams and 
trains and gas and shops are left behind, and all 
at once we are in the country. The road is lined 
with hedgerows, dusty indeed, but still alive. 
Elms of respectable dimensions look down upon 
big fields, with here and there an oak, and cows 
resting under it. At one turn of the road there is 
a recognizable odour of late-cut hay, and in the 
middle distance I distinctly perceive a turnip-field, 
out of which a covey of partridges might rise 
without surprising any one. We pull up and gaze 
around. Look where I will, I cannot see a house, 
nor even a cottage. Surely my friends have not 
played a practical joke on me and asked me to 
spend a day in an imaginary Paradise. The 
Gondolier looks at his perspiring horse, and mops 
his own brow, and gazes contemptuously on the 
landscape. '' I should call this the world's end 
if I was arst," he says. ^' Blow'd if they've even 
got a Public 'Ouse." Suddenly the sound of a 
shrill bell bursts on the ear. The Gondolier, 
who is a humorist, says '' Muffins." 



A SUBURBAN SUNDAY 141 

I jump out of the gondola, and pursue the 
welcome tinkle round a sharp angle in the road. 
There I see, perched on the brow of a sandy 
knoll, a small tin building, which a belfry and a 
cross proclaim to be a church. Inside I discover 
the Oldest Inhabitant pulling the muffin-bell with 
cheerful assiduity. He is more than ready to talk, 
and his whole discourse is as countrified as if 
he lived a hundred miles from Charing Cross. 
''Yes, this is a main lonely place. There ain't 
many people lives about 'ere. Why, ten years ago 

it was all fields. Now there are some houses 

not many. He lives in one himself. How far 
off? Well, a matter of a mile or so. He was 
born on the Squire's land ; his father worked on 
the farm. Yes, he's lived here all his life. Re- 
members it before there was a Crystal Palace, 
and when there was no railways or nothing. He 
hasn't often been in the train, and has only been 
up to London two or three times. Who goes 
to the church ? Well — not many, except the 
Squire's family and the school-children. Why 
was it built ? Oh, the Squire wants to get some 
rich folks to live round about. He's ready to 
part with his land for building ; and there's going 
to be a row of houses built just in front of the 
church. He reckons the people will be more 
likely to come now that there's a church for 
them to go to." And now the ''ten-minutes'* 
bell begins with livelier measure ; the Oldest 



142 SEEING AND HEARING 

Inhabitant shows me to a seat ; and, on the 
stroke of eleven, a shrill '^Amen" is heard in 
the vestry, and there enters a modest proces- 
sion of surpliced schoolboys and a clergyman in 
a green stole. His sons and daughters, the wife 
of the Oldest Inhabitant, and the sisters of the 
choristers, from the congregation, eked out by 
myself and my friends from Rosebank, who arrive 
a little flushed and complain that they have been 
waiting for me. The '' service is fully choral," as 
they say in accounts of fashionable weddings ; 
the clergyman preaches against the Education 
Bill, and a collection (of copper) is made to 
defray the expenses of a meeting at the Albert 
Hall. It is pleasant to see that, even in these 
secluded districts, the watch-dogs of the Church 
are on the alert. 



XX 

WINE AND WATER 

The second and third words are added to the title 
in deference to the weather. One must be a 
hardened toper if, with the thermometer at 93 in 
the shade, one can find comfort in the thought of 
undiluted wine. Rather I would take pattern from 
Thackeray's friend the Bishop, with his ^^ rounded 
episcopal apron." ^^ He put water into his wine. 
Let us respect the moderation of the Established 
Church." But water is an after-thought, inci- 
dental and ephemeral. It was on wine that I was 
meditating when the mercury rushed up and put 
more temperate thoughts into my head, and it 
was Sir Victor Horsley who set me on thinking 
about wine. Sir Victor has been discoursing at 
Ontario about the mischiefs of Alcohol, and the 
perennial controversy has revived in all its accus- 
tomed vigour. Once every five years some leading 
light of the medical profession declares with much 
solemnity that Alochol is a poison, that Wine is 

the foundation of death, and that Gingerbeer or 

143 



1-44 SEEING AND HEARING 

Toast-and-Water or Zoedone or Kopps or some 
kindred potion is the true and the sole eHxir 
of life. Sir Oracle always chooses August or 
September for the delivery of his dogma, and 
immediately there ensues a correspondence which 
suitably replaces '' Ought Women to Propose ? " 
^'Do We Believe?" and ^' What is Wrong?" 
Enthusiastic teetotallers fill the columns of the 
press with letters which in their dimensions rival 
the Enormous Gooseberry and in their demands 
on our credulity exceed the Sea Serpent. To 
these reply the advocates of Alcohol, with statistical 
accounts of patriarchs who always breakfasted on 
half-and-half, and near and dear relations who 
were rescued from the jaws of death by a timely 
exhibition of gin and bitters. And so the game 
goes merrily on till October recalls us to common 
sense. 

Thus far, the gem of this autumn's correspond- 
ence is, I think, the following instance contributed 
by an opponent of Sir Victor Horsley : — 

^' A British officer lay on his camp-bed in India 
suffering from cholera. His medical attendants 
had concluded that nothing more could be done 
for him, and that his seizure must end fatally. 
His friends visited him to shake his hand and to 
offer their sympathetic good-byes, including his 
dearest regimental chum, who, deciding to keep 
his emotion down by assuming a cheerful de- 



WINE AND WATER 145 

meanour, remarked, ^ Well, old chap, we all must 
go sometime and somehow. Is there anything 
you would like me to get you ? ' Hardly able to 
speak, the sufferer indicated, ^ I'll take a drop of 
champagne with you, as a last friendly act, if I 
can get it down.' With difficulty he took a little, 
and still lives to tell the story." 

Since the ^^affecting instance of Colonel Snobley" 
we have had nothing quite so rich as that — unless, 
indeed, it was the thrill of loyal rejoicing which 
ran round the nation when, just before Christmas 
1 87 1, it was announced that our present Sovereign, 
then in the throes of typhoid, had called for a 
glass of beer. Then, hke true Britons, reared on 
malt and hops, we felt that all was well, and 
addressed ourselves to our Christmas turkey with 
the comfortable assurance that the Prince of 
Wales had turned the corner. Reared on malt 
and hops, I said ; but many other ingredients went 
to the system on which some of us were reared. 
*' That poor creature, small beer " at meal-time, 
was reinforced by a glass of port wine at eleven, 
by brandy and water if ever one looked squeamish, 
by mulled claret at bedtime in cold weather, by 
champagne on all occasions of domestic festivity, 
and by hot elderberry wine if one had a cold in 
the head. Poison ? quotha. It was like Fonte- 
nelle's coffee, and, even though some of us have 
not yet turned eighty, at any rate we were not 

K 



^^ 



146 SEEING AND HEARING 

cut off untimely nor hurried into a drunkard's 
grave. And then think of the men whom the 
system produced ! Thackeray (who knew what 
he was talking about) said that '' our intellect 
ripens with good cheer and throws off surprising 
crops under the influence of that admirable liquid, 
claret." But all claret; according to Dr. Johnson, 
would be port if it could ; and a catena of port 
wine-drinkers could contain some of the most 
famous names of the last century. Mr. Gladstone, 
to whom the other pleasures of the table meant 
nothing, was a stickler for port, a believer in it, a 
judge of it. The only feeble speech which, in my 
hearing, he ever made was made after dining at 
an otherwise hospitable house where wine was 
not suffered to appear. Lord Tennyson, until 
vanquished by Sir Andrew Clark, drank his bottle 
of port every day, and drank it undecanted, for, 
as he justly observed, a decanter holds only eight 
glasses, but a black bottle nine. Mr. Browning, 
if he could have his own way, drank port all 
through dinner as well as after it. Sir Moses 
Montefiore, who, as his kinsfolk said, got up to 
par — or, in other words, completed his hundred 
years, — had drunk a bottle of port every day 
since he came to man's estate. Dr. Charles 
Sumner, the last Prince-Bishop of Winchester, so 
comely and benign that he was called '^ The 
Beauty of Holiness," lent ecclesiastical sanction 



WINE AND WATER 147 

to the same tradition by not only drinking port 
himself but distributing it with gracious gene- 
rosity to impoverished clergy. But, if I were 
to sing all the praises of port, I should have no 
room for other wines. 

Sherry — but no. Just now it is a point of 
literary honour not to talk about sherry ; ^ so, 
Dante-like, I do not reason about that particular 
wine, but gaze and pass on — only remarking, as I 
pass, that Mr. Ruskin's handsome patrimony was 
made out of sherry, and that this circumstance 
lent a peculiar zest to his utterances from the 
professorial chair at Oxford about the immorality 
of Capital and ^' the sweet poison of misused 
wine." An enthusiastic clergyman who wore the 
Blue Ribbon had been urging on Archbishop 
Benson his own strong convictions about the 
wickedness of wine-drinking. That courtly prelate 
listened with tranquil sympathy till the orator 
stopped for breath, and then observed, in suavest 
accents, " And yet I always think that good claret 
tastes very like a good creature of God." There 
are many who, in the depths of their conscience, 
agree with his Grace ; and they would drink 
claret and nothing but claret if they could get it 
at dinner. Far distant are the days when Lord 
Alvanley said, ^' The little wine I drink I drink at 

^ A correspondence on Sherry had just been running in the daily 
press. 



148 SEEING AND HEARING 

dinner, — but the great deal of wine I drink I drink 
after dinner." Nowadays no one drinks any after 
dinner. The King killed after-dinner drinking 
when he introduced cigarettes. But, for some 
inexplicable reason, men who have good claret 
will not produce it at dinner. They wait till the 
air is poisoned and the palate deadened with 
tobacco, and then complain that nobody drinks 
claret. The late Lord Granville (who had spent 
so many years of his life in taking the chair at 
public dinners that his friends called him Pere La 
Chaise) once told me that, where you are not sure 
of your beverages, it was always safest to drink 
hock. So little was drunk in England that it was 
not worth while to adulterate it. Since those 
days the still wines of Mosel have flooded the 
country, and it is difficult to repress the conviction 
that the principal vineyards must belong to the 
Medical Faculty, so persistently and so universally 
do they prescribe those rather dispiriting vintages. 
But, after all said and done, when we in the 
twentieth century say Wine, we mean champagne, 
even as our fathers meant port. And in cham- 
pagne we have seen a silent but epoch-making 
revolution. I well remember the champagne of 
my youth ; a liquid esteemed more precious than 
gold, and dribbled out into saucer-shaped glasses 
half-way through dinner on occasions of high 
ceremony. It was thick and sticky ; in colour a 



WINE AND WATER 149 

sort of brick-dust red, and it scarcely bubbled, let 
alone foaming or sparkling. 

" How sad, and bad, and mad it was, — 
And oh ! how it was sweet ! " 

Nowadays, we are told, more champagne is drunk 
in Russia than is grown in France. And the 
^' foaming grape," which Tennyson glorified, is so 
copiously diluted that it ranks only immedi- 
ately above small beer in the scale of alcoholic 
strength. Mr. Finching, the wine-merchant in 
" Little Dorrit," thought it " weak but palatable," 
and Lord St. Jerome in ^^ Lothair " was esteemed 
by the young men a '^ patriot," '' because he 
always gave his best champagne at his ball 
suppers." Such patriotism as that, at any rate, 
is not the refuge of a scoundrel. 

Wine and Water, I return to my beginnings, 
and, as I ponder the innocuous theme, all sorts 
of apt citations come crowding on the Ear of 
Memory. Bards of every age and cHme have 
sung the praises of wine, but songs in praise of 
water are more difficult to find. Once on a time, 
when a Maid of Honour had performed a rather 
mild air on the piano, Queen Victoria asked her 
what it was called. '' A German Drinking-Song, 
ma'am." ^' Drinking-Song ! One couldn't drink 
a cup of tea to it." A kindred feebleness seems 
to have beset all the poets who have tried to 
hymn the praises of water ; nor was it over- 



I50 SEEING AND HEARING 

come till some quite recent singer, who had not 
forgotten his Pindar, thus improved on the im- 
mortal Ariston men hudor : — 

" Pure water is the best of gifts 
That man to man can bring ; 
But what am I, that I should have 
The best of anything ? 

" Let Princes revel at the Pump, 
Let Peers enjoy their tea;^ 
But whisky, beer, or even wine 
Is good enough for me." 

^ Some commentators read — " Peers with the pond make free." 



XXI 

DINNER 

" We may live without poetry, music, and art ; 
We may live without conscience and live without heart ; 
We may live without friends ; we may live without books ; 
But civilized man cannot live without Cooks. 

''He may live without lore — what is knowledge but 
grieving ? 
He may live without hope — what is hope but deceiving ? 
He may live without love — what is passion but pining ? 
But where is the man that can live without dining ? '' 

The poet who wrote those feeling lines acted up 
to what he professed; and would, I think, have 
been interested in our present subject ; for he it 
was who, in the mellow glory of his literary and 
social fame, said : ^' It is many years since I felt 
hungry ; but, thank goodness, I am still greedy." 
In my youth there used to be a story of a High 
Sheriff who, having sworn to keep the jury in a 
trial for felony locked up without food or drink 
till they had agreed upon their verdict, was told 
that one of them was faint and had asked for a 
glass of water. The High Sheriff went to the 

Judge and requested his directions. The Judge, 

151 



152 SEEING AND HEARING 

after due reflection, ruled as follows : ^' You have 
sworn not to give the jury food or drink till they 
have agreed upon their verdict. A glass of water 
certainly is not food ; and, for my own part, I 
shouldn't call it drink. Yes ; you can give the 
man a glass of water." 

In a like spirit, I suppose that most of us would 
regard wine as being, if not of the essence, at 
least an inseparable accident, of Dinner ; but the 
subject of wine has been so freely handled in a 
previous chapter that, though it is by no means 
exhausted, we will to-day treat it only incidentally, 
and as it presents itself in connexion with the 
majestic theme of Dinner. 

The great Lord Holland, famed in Memoirs, 
was greater in nothing than in his quality of host ; 
and, like all the truly great, he manifested all 
his noblest attributes on the humblest occasions. 
Thus, he was once entertaining a schoolboy, who 
had come to spend a whole holiday at Holland 
House, and, in the openness of his heart, he told 
the urchin that he might have what he liked for 
dinner. '^ Young in years, but in sage counsels 
old," as the divine Milton says, the Westminster 
boy demanded, not sausages and strawberry cream, 
but a roast duck with green peas, and an apricot 
tart. The delighted host brushed away a tear 
of sensibility, and said, ** My boy, if in all the 
important questions of your life you decide as 
wisely as you have decided now, you will be a 



DINNER 153 

great and a good man." The prophecy was 
verified, and surely the incident deserved to be em- 
balmed in verse ; but, somehow, the poets always 
seem to have fought shy of Dinner. Byron, as 
might be expected, comes nearest to the proper 
inspiration when he writes of 

'* A roast and a ragout, 
And fish, and soup, by some side dishes back'd." 

But even this is tepid. Owen Meredith, in the 
poem from which I have already quoted, gives 
some portion of a menu in metre. Sydney Smith, 
as we all know, wrote a recipe for a salad in heroic 
couplets. Prior, I think, describes a City Feast, 
bringing in ^' swan and bustard " to rhyme with 
^' tart and custard." The late Mr. Mortimer Collins 
is believed to have been the only writer who ever 
put ^^ cutlet " into a verse. When Rogers wrote 
^^ the rich relics of a well-spent hour " he was not 
— though he ought to have been — thinking of 
dinner. Shakespeare and Spenser, and Milton and 
Wordsworth, and Shelley and Tennyson deal only 
with fragments and fringes of the great subject. 
They mention a joint or a dish, a vintage or a 
draught, but do not harmonize and co-ordinate 
even such slight knowledge of gastronomy as they 
may be supposed to have possessed. In fact, the 
subject was too great for them, and they wisely 
left it to the more adequate medium of prose. 
Among the prose-poets who have had the true 



154 SEEING AND HEARING 

feeling for Dinner, Thackeray stands supreme. 
When he describes it facetiously, as in '^ The 
Little Dinner at Timmins's *' or '< A Dinner in 
the City/' he is good ; but he is far, far better 
when he treats a serious theme seriously, as in 
^'Memorials of Gormandizing" and ^'Greenwich 
Whitebait." 

I assign the first place to Thackeray because 
his eulogy is more finished, more careful, more 
delicate ; but Sir Walter had a fine, free style, 
a certain broadness of effect, in describing a 
dinner which places him high in the list. Those 
venison pasties and spatchcocked eels and butts 
of Rhenish wine and stoups of old Canary which 
figure so largely in the historical novels still 
make my mouth water. The dinner which Rob 
Roy gave Bailie Nicol Jarvie, though of necessity 
cold, was well conceived ; and, barring the solan 
goose, I should have deeply enjoyed the banquet 
at which the Antiquary entertained Sir Arthur 
Wardour, The imaginary feast which Caleb 
Balderstone prepared for the Lord Keeper was so 
good that it deserved to be real. Dickens, the 
supreme exponent of High Tea, knew very little 
about Dinner, though I remember a good meal of 
the bourgeois type at the house of the Patriarch in 
*' Little Dorrit." Lord Lytton dismissed even a 
bad dinner all too curtly when he said that ^' the 
soup was cold, the ice was hot, and everything in 
the house was sour except the vinegar." James 



DINNER 155 

Payn left in his one unsuccessful book, ^' Meliboeus 
in London," the best account, because the simplest, 
of a Fish-dinner at Greenwich ; in that special 
department he is run close by Lord Beaconsfield 
in '^ Tancred " ; but it is no disgrace to be equalled 
or even surpassed by the greatest man who ever 
described a dinner. With Lord Beaconsfield gas- 
tronomy was an instinct ; it breathes in every 
page of his Letters to his Sister. He found a 
roast swan ^' very white and good." He dined 
out '' to meet some truffles — very agreeable com- 
pany." At Sir Robert Peel's he reported " the 
second course really remarkable," and noted the 
startling fact that Sir Robert '' boldly attacked his 
turbot with his knife." It was he, I believe 
who said of a rival Chancellor of the Exchequer 
that his soup was made from '^ deferred stock." 
'Twere long to trace the same generous enthusi- 
asm for Dinner through all Lord Beaconsfield's 
Novels. He knew the Kitchen of the Past as well 
as of the Present. Lady Annabel's Bill of Fare in 
'* Venetia " is a monument of culinary scholarship. 
Is there anything in fiction more moving than the 
agony of the chef at Lord Montacute's coming 
of age ? '^ It was only by the most desperate 
personal exertions that I rescued the souffles. It 
was an affair of the Bridge of Areola." And, if 
it be objected that all these scenes belong to a 
rather remote past, let us take this vignette of the 
fashionable solicitor in ^* Lothair," Mr. Putney 



156 SEEING AND HEARING 

Giles, as he sits down to dinner after a day of 
exciting work : *^ It is a pleasent thing to see an 
opulent and prosperous man of business, sanguine 
and full of health and a little overworked, at that 
royal meal, Dinner. How he enjoys his soup ! 
And how curious in his fish ! How critical in his 
entreej and how nice in his Welsh mutton ! His 
exhausted brain rallies under the glass of dry 
sherry, and he realizes all his dreams with the aid 
of claret that has the true flavour of the violet." 
^' Doctors," said Thackeray, who knew and loved 
them, ^^ notoriously dine well. When my excel- 
lent friend Sangrado takes a bumper, and saying, 
with a shrug and a twinkle of his eye. Video meliora 
proboqtie, Deteriora sequor, tosses off the wine, I 
always ask the butler for a glass of that bottle." 
That tradition of medical gastronomy dates from 
a remote period of our history. ^' Culina," by 
far the richest Cookery-book ever composed, was 
edited and given to the world in 18 10 by a 
doctor— ^< A. Hunter, M.D., F.R.S." Dr. William 
Kitchener died in 1827, but not before his " Cook's 
Oracle " and ^< Peptic Precepts " had secured him 
an undying fame. In our own days. Sir Henry 
Thompson's *' Octaves " were the most famous 
dinners in London, both as regards food and 
wine ; and his ^' Food and Feeding " is the best 
guide-book to greediness I know. But here I 
feel that I am descending into details. ^' Dear 
Bob, I have seen the mahoganies of many men." 



DINNER 157 

But to-day I am treating of Dinner rather than of 
dinners — of the abstract Idea which has its real 
existence in a higher sphere, — not of the concrete 
forms in which it is embodied on this earth. 
Perhaps further on I may have a word to say 
about " Dinners." 



XXII 
DINNERS 

Sero sed serio. It is the motto of the House of 
Cecil ; and the late Lord Salisbury, long detained 
by business at the Foreign Office and at length 
sitting down to his well-earned dinner, used to 
translate it — ^' Unpunctual, but hungry." Such a 
formula may suitably introduce the subject of our 
present meditations ; and, although that subject is 
not temporary or ephemeral, but rather belongs 
to all time, still at this moment it is specially 
opportune. Sir James Crichton-Browne has been 
frightening us to death with dark tales of physical 
degeneration, and he has been heartless enough 
to do so just when we are reeling under the 
effects of Sir Victor Horsley's attack on Alcohol. 
Burke, in opposing a tax on gin, pleaded that 
'^ mankind have in every age called in some 
material assistance to their moral consolation." 
These modern men of science tell us that we 
must by no means call in gin or any of its more 
genteel kinsfolk in the great family of Alcohol. 
Water hardly seems to meet the case — besides, 

it has typhoid germs in it. Tea and coffee are 

158 



DINNERS 159 

*' nerve-stimulants," and must therefore be avoided 
by a neurotic generation. Physical degeneracy, 
then, must be staved off with food ; food, in a 
sound philosophy of life, means Dinner ; and 
Dinner, the ideal or abstraction, reveals itself to 
man in the concrete form of Dinners. 

Having thus formulated my theme, I part com- 
pany, here and now, with poets and romancists 
and all that dreamy crew, and betake myself, 
like Mr. Gradgrind, to facts. In loftier phrase, I 
pursue the historic method, and narrate, with the 
accuracy of Freeman, though, alas ! without the 
brilliancy of Froude, some of the actual dinners 
on which mankind has lived. Creasy wrote of 
the ^' Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World " — the 
Fifteen Decisive Dinners of the World would be 
a far more interesting theme ; but the generous 
catalogue unrolls its scroll, and ^^ fifteen " would 
have to be multiplied by ten or a hundred before 
the tale was told. A friend of mine had a pious 
habit of pasting into an album the Menu of every 
dinner at which he had enjoyed himself. Studying 
the album retrospectively, he used to put an 
asterisk against the most memorable of these 
records. There were three asterisks against the 
Menu of a dinner given by Lord Lyons at the 
British Embassy at Paris. ^* Quails and Roman 
Punchy'' said my friend with tears in his voice. 
" You can't get beyond that." This evidently 
had been one of the Fifteen Decisive Dinners of 



i6o SEEING AND HEARING 

his gastronomic world. Did not the poet Young 
exclaim, in one of his most pietistic '* Night 
Thoughts/' 

"The undevout Gastronomer is mad"? 

Or, has an unintended "G" crept into the line? 

I treasure among my relics the '^ Bill of Fare " 
(for in those days we talked English) of a Tavern 
Dinner for seven persons, triumphantly eaten in 
175 1. Including vegetables and dessert, and ex- 
cluding beverages, it comprises thirty-eight items ; 
and the total cost was ;^8i, iis. 6d. (without 
counting the Waiter). Twenty years later than 
the date of this heroic feast Dr. Johnson, who 
certainly could do most things which required the 
use of a pen, vaunted in his overweening pride 
that he could write a cookery-book, and not only 
this, but ^^ a better book of cookery than has ever 
yet been written ; it should be a book on philo- 
sophical principles." The philosophical principles 
must have been those of the Stoic school if they 
could induce his readers or his guests to endure 
patiently such a dinner as he gave poor Bozzy on 
Easter-day, 1773 — ''a very good soup, a boiled 
leg of lamb and spinach, a veal pie, and a rice 
pudding." One is glad to know that the soup 
was good ; for, as Sir Henry Thompson said in 
^' Food and Feeding," ^* the rationale of the initial 
soup has been often discussed," and the best 
opinion is that the function of the soup is to 



DINNERS i6i 

fortify the digestion against what is to come. A 
man who is to dine on boiled lamb, veal pie, and 
rice pudding needs all the fortifying he can get. 
With some of us it would indeed be a ^^ decisive " 
dinner — the last which we should consume on 
this planet. 

True enjoyment, as well as true virtue, lies in 
the Golden Mean ; and, as we round the corner 
where the eighteenth century meets the nine- 
teenth, we begin to encounter a system of dining 
less profligately elaborate than the Tavern Dinner 
of 175 1; and yet less poisonously crude than Dr. 
Johnson's Easter Dinner of 1773. The first Earl 
of Dudley (who died in 1833) disdained kickshaws, 
and, with manly simplicity, demanded only *^ a 
good soup, a small turbot, a neck of venison, duck- 
lings with green peas (or chicken with asparagus), 
and an apricot tart." Even more meagre was the 
repast which Macaulay deemed sufficient for his 
own wants and those of a friend : ^' Ellis came to 
dinner at seven. I gave him a lobster curry, wood- 
cock, and maccaroni." From such frugality, bor- 
dering on asceticism, it is a relief to turn to the more 
bounteous hospitality of Sir Robert Peel, of whose 
dinner the youthful Disraeli wrote : ^' It was curi- 
ously sumptuous ; every delicacy of the season, and 
the second course, of dried salmon, olives, caviare, 
woodcock ^iQj foiegras, and every combination of 
cured herring, &c., was really remarkable." Yes, 
indeed ! ^^ on dine remarquablement chez vous." 

L 



i62 SEEING AND HEARING 

After all, the social life of the capital naturally 
takes its tone and manner from the august centre 
round which it moves. If the Court dines well, 
so do those who frequent it. The legs of mutton 
and apple dumplings which satisfied the simple 
taste of George III. read now like a horrid dream. 
Perhaps, as the digestion and the brain are so 
closely connected, they helped to drive him mad. 
His sons ate more reasonably ; and, in a later 
generation, gastronomic science in high places was 
quickened by the thoughtful intelligence of Prince 
Albert directing the practical skill of Francatelli 
and Moret. Here is a brief abstract or epitome 
of Queen Victoria's dinner on the 21st of Sep- 
tember 1 84 1. It begins modestly with two 
soups ; it goes on, more daringly, to four kinds 
of fish ; four also are the joints, followed (not, 
as now, preceded) by eight entrees. Then come 
chickens and partridges ; vegetables, savouries, 
and sweets to the number of fifteen : and, lest 
any one should still suffer from the pangs of un- 
satiated desire, there were thoughtfully placed on 
the sideboard Roast Beef, Roast Mutton, Haunch 
of Venison, Hashed Venison, and Riz au consomme'. 
But those were famous days. Fifty-four years 
had sped their course, and Her Majesty's Christ- 
mas Dinner in the year 1895 shows a lamentable 
shrinkage. Three soups indeed there were, but 
only one fish, and that a Fried Sole, which can be 
produced by kitchens less than Royal. To this 



DINNERS 163 

succeeded a beggarly array of four entreesy three 
joints, and two sorts of game ; but the Menu re- 
covers itself a little in seven sweet dishes ; while 
the sideboard displayed the ^' Boar's Head, Baron 
of Beef, and Woodcock Pie/' which supplied the 
thrifty Journalist with appropriate copy at every 
Christmas of Her Majesty's long reign. 

When Lord Derby and Mr. Disraeli had suc- 
ceeded in ^^ dishing the Whigs " by establishing 
Household Suffrage, they and their colleagues 
went with a light heart and a good conscience to 
dine at the Ship Hotel, Greenwich, on the 14th 
of August 1867. That was, in some senses, a 
<^ decisive " dinner, for it sealed the destruction of 
the old Conservatism and inaugurated the reign of 
Tory Democracy. The triumphant Ministers had 
turtle soup, eleven kinds of fish, two entrees, a 
haunch of venison, poultry, ham, grouse, leverets, 
five sweet dishes, and two kinds of ice. Elimin- 
ating the meat, this is very much the same sort of 
dinner as that at which Cardinal Wiseman was 
entertained by his co-religionists when he assumed 
the Archbishopric of Westminster, and I remem- 
ber that his Life, by Mr. Wilfred Ward, records 
the dismay with which his '' maigre " fare inspired 
more ascetic temperaments. ^^ He kept the table 
of a Roman Cardinal, and surprised some Puseyite 
guests by four courses of fish in Lent." There 
is something very touching in the exculpatory 
language of his friend and disciple Father Faber — 



i64 SEEING AND HEARING 

^'The dear Cardinal had a Lobster-salad side to 
his character." 

Ever since the days of Burns, the '* chiel amang 
ye takin' notes" has been an unpopular char- 
acter, and not without reason, as the following 
extract shows. Mr. John Evelyn Denison (after- 
wards Lord Eversley) was Speaker of the House of 
Commons in 1865, and on the eve of the opening 
of the Session he dined, according to custom, with 
Lord Palmerston, then Prime Minister and Leader 
of the House. Lord Palmerston was in his eighty- 
first year and gouty. Political issues of the gravest 
importance hung on his life. The Speaker, like a 
ruse old politician as he was, kept a cold grey eye 
on Palmerston's performance at dinner, regarding 
it, rightly, as an index to his state of health ; and 
this was what he reported about his host's capa- 
cities : <' His dinner consisted of turtle soup, fish, 
patties, fricandeau, a third entree, a slice of roast 
mutton, a second slice, a slice of hard-looking 
ham. In the second course, pheasant, pudding, 
jelly. At dessert, dressed oranges and half a 
large pear. He drank seltzer water only, but late 
in the dinner one glass of sweet champagne, and, 
I think^ a glass of sherry at dessert." This was one 
of the ^' decisive " dinners, for Palmerston died in 
the following October. The only wonder is that 
he lived so long. The dinner which killed the 
Duke of Wellington was a cold pie and a salad. 

" I am not one who much or oft delight " to 



DINNERS 165 

mingle the serious work of Dinner with the frivo- 
lities of Literature ; but other people, more prone 
to levity, are fond of constructing Bills of Fare 
out of Shakespeare ; and our National Bard is so 
copious in good eating and drinking that a doz^n 
Menus might be bodied forth from his immortal 
page. The most elaborate of these attempts took 
place in New York on the 23rd of April i860. 
The Bill of Fare lies before me as I write. It 
contains twenty-four items, and an appropriate 
quotation is annexed to each. The principal joint 
was Roast Lamb, and to this is attached the tag— 

" Innocent 
As is the sucking lamb." 

When the late Professor Thorold Rogers, an 
excellent Shakespearean, saw this citation, he ex- 
claimed, ^' That was an opportunity missed. They 
should have put — 

' So young, and so untender ! ' " 



XXIII 

LUNCHEON 

"Munch on, crunch on, take your nuncheon, 
Breakfast, dinner, supper, luncheon ! '' 

So sings, or says, Robert Browning in his ditty 
of the Pied Piper, and it is to be remarked that 
he was not driven to invent the word <' nuncheon " 
by the necessity of finding a rhyme for ^' luncheon," 
for '^ puncheon " was ready to his hand, and ^^ nun- 
cheon " was not a creation, but an archaism, de- 
fined by Johnson as ^'food eaten between meals." 
Let no one who perpends the amazing dinners 
eaten by our forefathers accuse those good men 
of gluttony. Let us rather bethink ourselves of 
their early and unsatisfying breakfasts, their lives 
of strenuous labour, their ignorance of five o'clock 
tea ; and then thank the goodness and the grace 
which on our birth have smiled, and have given us 
more frequent meals and less ponderous dinners. 
Lord John Russell (i 792-1 878) published anony- 
mously in 1820 a book of Essays and Sketches 
*' by a Gentleman who has left his Lodgings." On 
the usages of polite society at the time no one 

was better qualified to speak, for Woburn Abbey 

166 



LUNCHEON 167 

was his home, and at Bowood and Holland House 
he was an habitual guest ; and this is his testimony 
to the dining habits of society : '^ The great in- 
convenience of a London life is the late hour of 
dinner. To pass the day impransus and then to 
sit down to a great dinner at eight o'clock is 
entirely against the first dictates of common sense 
and common stomachs. Women, however, are 
not so irrational as men, and generally sit down 
to a substantial luncheon at three or four ; if men 
would do the same, the meal at night might be 
lightened of many of its weighty dishes and con- 
versation would be no loser." So far, Luncheon 
(or Nuncheon) would seem to be exclusively a 
ladies' meal ; and yet Dr. Kitchener could not have 
been prescribing for ladies only when he gave 
his surprising directions for a luncheon ^^ about 
twelve," which might '^ consist of a bit of roasted 
Poultry, a basin of Beef Tea or Eggs poached or 
boiled in the shell, Fish plainly dressed, or a Sand- 
wich ; stale Bread, and half a pint of good Home- 
brewed Beer, or Toast and Water, with about one 
fourth or one-third part of its measure of Wine, of 
which Port is preferred, or one-seventh of Brandy." 
In Miss Austen's books, Luncheon is dismissed 
under the cursory appellation of ^^Cold Meat," 
and Madeira and water seems to have been its 
accompaniment ; but more prodigal methods soon 
began to creep in. The repast which Sam Weller 
pronounced ^^ a wery good notion of a lunch" 



i68 SEEING AND HEARING 

consisted of veal pie, bread, knuckle of ham, cold 
beef, beer, and cold punch ; and let it be observed 
in passing that, had he used the word ^' lunch " in 
polite society, the omission of the second syllable 
would have been severely reprehended by a gener- 
ation which still spoke of the '^ omnibus " and had 
only just discontinued '' cabriolet." The verb '^ to 
lunch " was even more offensive than the sub- 
stantive from which it was derived ; and Lord 
Beaconsfield, describing the Season of 1832, says 
that ^' ladies were luncheoning on Perigord pie, 
or coursing in whirling britskas." To Perigord 
pies as a luncheon dish for the luxurious and 
eupeptic may be added venison pasties — 

" Now broach me a cask of Malvoisie, 
Bring pasty from the doe," 

said the Duchess in ^^ Coningsby." '^That has 
been my luncheon — a poetic repast." And Lady 
St. Jerome, when she took Lothair to a picnic, fed 
him with lobster sandwiches and Chablis. Fiction 
is ever the mirror of fact ; and a lady still living, 
who published her Memoirs only a year or two 
ago, remembers the Lady Holland who patronized 
Macaulay ^' sitting at a beautiful luncheon of cold 
turkey and summer salad." 

But, in spite of all these instances. Luncheon 
was down to 1840 or thereabouts a kind of clan- 
destine and unofficial meal. The ladies wanted 
something to keep them up. It was nicer for the 



LUNCHEON 169 

children than having their dinner in the nursery. 
Papa would be kept at the House by an impending 
division^ and must get a snack when he could — 
and so on and so forth. If a man habitually sate 
down to luncheon, and ate it through, he was 
contemned as unversed in the science of feeding. 
^' Luncheon is a reflection on Breakfast and an 
insult to Dinner ; " and moreover it stamped the 
eater as an idler. No one who had anything to 
do could find time for a square meal in the 
middle of the day. When Mr. Gladstone was at 
the Board of Trade, his only luncheon consisted 
of an Abernethy biscuit which Mrs. Gladstone 
brought down to the office and forced on the 
reluctant Vice-President. 

But after 1840 a change set in. Prince Albert 
was notoriously fond of luncheon, and Queen 
Victoria humoured him. They dined late, and 
the Luncheon at the Palace became a very real 
and fully recognized meal. At it the Queen 
sometimes received her friends, as witness the 
Royal Journal — ^' Mamma came to luncheon with 
her lady and gentleman." It could not have 
been pleasant for the *^ lady and gentleman," but 
it established the practice. 

^' Sunday luncheon " was always a thing apart. 
For some reason not altogether clear, but either 
because devotion long sustained makes a strong 
demand on the nervous system or because a 
digestive nap was the best way of employing 



170 SEEING AND HEARING 

Sunday afternoon, men who ate no luncheon on 
week-days devoured Roast Beef and Yorkshire 
Pudding on Sundays and had their appropriate 
reward. Bishop Wilberforce, whose frank self- 
communings are always such delightful reading, 
wrote in his diary for Sunday, October 27, 1861 : 
'^ Preached in York Minster. Very large con- 
gregation. Back to Bishopthorpe. Sleepy, eheu^ 
at afternoon service ; must eat no luncheon on 
Sunday." When Luncheon had once firmly estab- 
lished itself, not merely as a meal but as an 
institution, Sunday luncheons in London became 
recognized centres of social life. Where there 
was even a moderate degree of intimacy a guest 
might drop in and be sure of mayonnaise, chicken, 
and welcome. I well remember an occasion of 
this kind when I saw social Presence of Mind 
exemplified, as I thought and think, on an heroic 
scale. Luncheon was over. It had not been a 
particularly bounteous meal ; the guests had been 
many ; the chicken had been eaten to the drum- 
stick and the cutlets to the bone. Nothing re- 
mained but a huge Trifle, of chromatic and 
threatening aspect, on which no one had ventured 
to embark. Coffee was just coming, when the 
servant entered with an anxious expression, and 
murmured to the hostess that Monsieur Petitpois 
— a newly arrived French attache — had come 
and seemed to expect luncheon. The hostess 
grasped the situation in an instant, and issued 



LUNCHEON 171 

her commands with a promptitude and a direct- 
ness which the Duke of Wellington could not have 
surpassed. ^^ Clear everything away, but leave 
the Trifle. Then show M. Petitpois in." Enter 
Petitpois. ^' Delighted to see you. Quite right. 
Always at home at Sunday luncheon. Pray come 
and sit here and have some Trifle. It is our 
national Sunday dish." Poor young Petitpois, 
actuated by the same principle which made the 
Prodigal desire the husks, filled himself with 
sponge-cake, jam, and whipped cream ; and went 
away looking rather pale. If he kept a journal, 
he no doubt noted the English Sunday as one of 
our most curious institutions, and the Trifle as its 
crowning horror. 

Cardinal Manning, as all the world knows, 
never dined. '' I never eat and I never drink," 
said the Cardinal. ^' I am sorry to say I cannot. 
I like dinner society very much. You see the 
world, and you hear things which you do not 
hear otherwise." Certainly that Cardinal was a fic- 
titious personage, but he was drawn with fidelity 
from Cardinal Manning, who ate a very comfort- 
able dinner at two o'clock, called it luncheon, 
and maintained his principle. There have always 
been some houses where the luncheons were much 
more famous than the dinners. Dinner, after all, 
is something of a ceremony : it requires fore- 
thought, care, and organization. Luncheon is more 
of a scramble, and, in the case of a numerous 



172 SEEING AND HEARING 

and scattered family, it is the pleasantest of re- 
unions. '' When all the daughters are married 
nobody eats luncheon/' said Lothair to his 
solicitor, Mr. Putney Giles : but Mr. Putney Giles, 
^'who always affected to know everything, and 
generally did," replied that, even though the 
daughters were married, ^^the famous luncheons 
at Crecy House would always go on and be a 
popular mode of their all meeting." When Lord 
Beaconsfield wrote that passage he was thinking 
of Chesterfield House, May Fair, some twenty 
years before Lord Burton bought it. Mr. Glad- 
stone, who thought modern luxury rather disgust- 
ing, used to complain that nowadays life in a 
country house meant three dinners a day, and if 
you reckoned sandwiches and poached eggs at 
five o'clock tea, nearly four. Indeed, the only 
difference that I can perceive between a modern 
luncheon and a modern dinner is that at the 
former meal you don't have soup or a printed 
menu. But at a luncheon at the Mansion House 
you have both ; so it is well for Lord Mayors 
that their reigns are brief. 

One touch of personal reminiscence may close 
this study. While yet the Old Bailey stood erect 
and firm, as grim in aspect as in association, I 
used often, through the courtesy of a civic official, 
to share the luncheon of the judge and the 
aldermen, eaten during an interval in the trial, in 
a gloomy chamber behind the Bench. I still see. 



LUNCHEON 173 

in my mind's eye, a learned judge, long since gone 
to his account, stuffing cold beef and pigeon pie, 
and quaffing London stout, black as Erebus and 
heavy as lead. After this repast he went back 
into Court (where he never allowed a window to 
be opened) and administered what he called 
justice through the long and lethargic afternoon. 
No one who had witnessed the performance 
could doubt the necessity for a Court of Criminal 
Appeal. 



XXIV 
TEA 

Few, I fear, are the readers of Mrs. Sherwood. 
Yet in " The Fairchild Family " she gave us some 
pictures of EngHsh country life at the end of the 
eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth 
century which neither Jane Austen nor Mrs. 
Gaskell ever beat, and at least one scene of horror 
which is still unsurpassed. I cannot say as much 
for '^ Henry Milner, or the Story of a Little Boy 
who was not brought up according to the Fashions 
of this World." No, indeed — very far from it. 
And Henry now recurs to my mind only because, 
in narrating his history, Mrs. Sherwood archly in- 
troduces a sentence which may serve as a motto 
for this meditation. Like Bismarck (though un- 
like him in other respects), she was fond of 
parading scraps of a rather bald Latinity ; and, 
in this particular instance, she combines simple 
scholarship with staid humour, making her hero 
exclaim to a tea-making lady, ^' Non possum vivere 
sine Te." The play on Te and Tea will be re- 
marked as very ingenious. Barring the Latinity 
and the jest, I am at one with Mrs. Sherwood in 

the sentiment, '^ My heart leaps up when I be- 

174 



TEA 17s 

hold " a teapot, like Wordsworth's when he beheld 
a rainbow ; and the mere mention of tea in liter- 
ature stirs in me thoughts which lie too deep for 
words. Thus I look forward with the keenest 
interest to 

THE BOOK OF TEA 

By Okakura-Kakuzo 

which the publishers promise at an early date. 
Solemn indeed, as befits the subject, is the pre- 
liminary announcement : — 

''This book in praise of tea, written by a 
Japanese, will surely find sympathetic readers in 
England, where the custom of tea-drinking has 
become so important a part of the national daily 
life. Mr. Kakuzo shows that the English are still 
behind the Japanese in their devotion to tea. In 
England afternoon tea is variously regarded as a 
fashionable and luxurious aid to conversation, a 
convenient way of passing the time, or a restful 
and refreshing pause in the day's occupation, but 
in Japan tea-drinking is ennobled into Teaism, and 
the English cup of tea seems trivial by comparison." 

This is the right view of Tea. The wrong view 
was lately forced into sad prominence in the 
Coroner's Court : — 

Dangers of Tea-Drinking 

'' In summing up at a Hackney inquest on 
Saturday, Dr. Wynn Westcott, the coroner, com- 



176 SEEING AND HEARING 

mented on the fact that deceased, a woman of 
twenty-nine, had died suddenly after a meal of 
steak, tomatoes, and tea. One of the most in- 
judicious habits, he said, was to drink tea with a 
meat meal. Tea checked the flow of the gastric 
juice which was necessary to digestion. He was 
sorry if that went against teetotal doctrines, but if 
people must be teetotallers they had best drink 
water and not tea with their meals." 

My present purpose is to enquire whether the 
right or the wrong view has more largely predomi- 
nated in English history and literature. If, after 
the manner of a German commentator, I were 
to indulge in *' prolegomena " about the history, 
statistics, and chemical analysis of Tea, I should 
soon overflow my limits ; and I regard a pain- 
fully well-known couplet in which ^' tea " rhymes 
with ^' obey " as belonging to that class of quota- 
tions which no self-respecting writer can again 
resuscitate. Perhaps a shade, though only a shade, 
less hackneyed is Cowper's tribute to the divine 
herb : — 

" Now stir the fire, and close the shutters fast, 
Let fall the curtains, wheel the sofa round, 
And, while the bubbling and loud-hissing urn 
Throws up a steamy column, and the cups, 
That cheer but not inebriate, wait on each, 
So let us welcome peaceful evening in.'' 

But this really leaves the problem unsolved. 
Cowper drank tea, and drank it in the evening ; 



TEA 177 

but whether he ** had anything with it," as the 
phrase is, remains uncertain. Bread and butter, 
I think, he must have had, or toast, or what 
Thackeray scoffs at as the '* blameless muffin"; 
but I doubt about eggs, and feel quite sure that 
he did not mingle meat and tea. So much for 
1795, and I fancy that the practice of 18 16 (when 
^* Emma " was published) was not very different. 
When Mrs. Bates went to spend the evening 
with Mr. Woodhouse there was ^' vast deal 
of chat, and backgammon, and tea was made 
downstairs " ; but, though the passage is a 
little obscure, I am convinced that the '' biscuits 
and baked apples " were not served with the 
tea, but came in later with the ill-fated '' fricassee 
of sweetbread and asparagus." Lord Beacons- 
field, who was born in 1804, thus describes the 
evening meal at ^^ Hurstley " — a place drawn in 
detail from his early home in Buckinghamshire : 
^^Then they were summoned to tea. . . . The 
curtains were drawn and the room lighted ; 
an urn hissed ; there were piles of bread and 
butter, and a pyramid of buttered toast." And, 
when the family from the Hall went to tea at the 
Rectory, they found ^' the tea-equipage a picture 
of abundance and refinement. Such pretty china, 
and such various and delicious cakes ! White 
bread, and brown bread, and plum cakes, and seed 
cakes, and no end of cracknels, and toasts, dry 
or buttered." Still here is no mention of animal 

M 



178 SEEING AND HEARING 

foods, and even Dr. Wynn Westcott would have 
found nothing to condemn. The same refined 
tradition meets us in '* Cranford/' which, as we all 
know from its reference to " Pickwick," describes 
the social customs of 1836-7. Mrs. Jameson was 
the Queen of Society in Cranford, and, when she 
gave a tea-party, the herb was reinforced only by 
'^very thin bread and butter," and Miss Barker 
was thought rather vulgar — " a tremendous word 
in Cranford " — because she gave seed cake as well. 
Even in ^^ Pickwick " itself, though that immortal 
book does not pretend to depict the manners of 
polite society, the tea served in the sanctum of the 
'' Marquis of Granby " at Dorking was flanked by 
nothing more substantial than a plate of hot 
buttered toast. 

Impressive, therefore, almost startling, is the 
abrupt transition from these ill-supported teas 
(which, according to Dr. Wynn Westcott, were 
hygienically sound) to the feast, defiant of all gas- 
tronomic law, which Mrs. Snagsby spread for Mr. 
and Mrs. Chadband — '* Dainty new bread, crusty 
twists, cool fresh butter, thin slices of ham, tongue, 
and German sausage, delicate little rows of an- 
chovies nestling in parsley, new-laid eggs brought 
up warm in a napkin, and hot buttered toast." 
German sausage washed down with tea ! What, 
oh what, would the Coroner say ? And what 
must be the emotions of the waiters at the House 
of Commons, with their traditions of Bellamy's 



TEA 179 

veal pies and Mr. Disraeli's port, when they see 
the Labour Members sit down to a refection of 
Tea and Brawn ? But, it may be urged, Medical 
Science is always shifting its ground, and what is 
the elixir of life to-day may be labelled Poison 
to-morrow. Thus Thackeray, using his keenest 
art to stigmatize the unwholesome greediness of 
a City Dinner, describes the surfeited guests 
adjourning after dinner to the Tea Room, and 
there ^^ drinking slops and eating buttered muffins 
until the grease trickled down their faces." This 
was written in 1847 ; but in 1823 the great Dr. 
Kitchener, both physician and gastronomer, pro- 
nounces thus — '^ Tea after Dinner assists Digestion, 
quenches Thirst, and thereby exhilarates the 
Spirits," and he suggests as an acceptable alter- 
native **a. little warmed Milk, with a teaspoonful 
of Rum, a bit of Sugar, and a little Nutmeg." 
Truly our forefathers must have had remarkable 
digestions. 

'^ These be black Vespers' pageants." I have 
spoken so far of Tea in the evening. When did 
people begin to drink Tea in the morning ? I 
seem to remember that, in our earlier romancists 
and dramatists. Coffee is the beverage for break- 
fast. Certainly it is so — and inimitably described 
as well — in Lord Beaconsfield's account of a 
Yorkshire breakfast in '< Sybil." At Holland 
House, which was the very ark and sanctuary of 
luxury, Macaulay in 1831 breakfasted on *^very 



i8o SEEING AND HEARING 

good coffee and very good tea, and very good 
eggS; butter kept in the midst of ice, and hot 
rolls." Here the two liquids are proffered, but 
meat is rigidly excluded, and Dr. Wynn Westcott's 
law of life observed. But nine years later the 
character of breakfast had altered, and altered 
in an unwholesome direction. The increasing 
practice of going to Scotland for the shooting 
season had famiharized Englishmen with the more 
substantial fare of the Scotch breakfast, and since 
that time the unhallowed combination of meat 
and tea has been the law of our English breakfast- 
table. Sir Thomas in the ^' Ingoldsby Legends," 
on the morning of his mysterious disappearance, 
had eaten for breakfast some bacon, an egg, a 
little broiled haddock, and a slice of cold beef. 

" And then — let me see ! — he had two, perhaps three, 
Cups (with sugar and cream) of strong gunpowder tea, 
With a spoonful in each of some choice eau de vie, 
Which with nine out of ten would perhaps disagree.'* 

The same trait may be remembered in the case of 
Mrs. Pinching, who, though she had cold fowl 
and broiled ham for breakfast, '' measured out a 
spoonful or two of some brown liquid that smelt 
like brandy and put it into her tea, saying that she 
was obliged to be careful to follow the directions 
of her medical man, though the flavour was any- 
thing but agreeable." 

Time passes, and the subject expands. We 



TEA i8i 

have spoken of Tea in the morning and Tea in 
the evening. To these must be added, if the topic 
were to be treated with scientific completeness, 
that early cup which opens our eyes, as each new 
day dawns, on this world of opportunity and 
wonder, and that last dread draught with which 
the iron nerves of Mr. Gladstone were composed 
to sleep after a late night in the House of 
Commons. But I have no space for these divaga- 
tions, and must crown this imperfect study of 
Tea with the true, though surprising, statement 
that I myself — moi qui vous park — have known 
the inventor of Five o'Clock Tea. This was Anna 
Maria Stanhope, daughter of the third Earl of 
Harrington and wife of the seventh Duke of 
Bedford. She died at an advanced age — rouged 
and curled and trim to the last — in 1857 ; but 
not before her life's work was accomplished and 
Five o'clock Tea established among the perma- 
nent institutions of our free and happy country. 
Surely she is worthier of a place in the Positivist 
Kalendar of those who have benefited Humanity 
than Hippocrates, Harvey, or Arkwright ; and yet 
Sir Algernon West writes thus in his book of 
<< Recollections " : <* Late in the 'forties and in the 
'fifties. Five o'Clock Teas were just coming into 
vogue, the old Duchess of Bedford's being, as I 
considered, very dreary festivities." Such is grati- 
tude, and such is fame. 



XXV 

SUPPER 

" S is the Supper, where all went in pairs ; 
T is the Twaddle they talked on the stairs." 

Though the merry muse of dear '* C. S. C." may 
thus serve to introduce our subject, the repast 
which he has in view is only a very special and 
peculiar — one had almost said an unnatural — 
form of Supper. The Ball Supper, eaten any- 
where between 12 o'clock and 2 a.m., is clearly a 
thing apart from the Supper which, in days of 
Early Dinner, made England great. Yet the Ball 
Supper had its charms, and they have been cele- 
brated both in prose and in verse. Byron knew 
all about them : — 

" I've seen some balls and revels in my time, 
And stay'd them over for some silly reason." 

One of those reasons was the prospect of supping 
with Bessie Rawdon,^ the only girl he ever saw 

" Whose bloom could after dancing dare the dawn." 

In her society a fresh zest was added to ^< the 

^ Afterwards Lady William Russell. 

182 



SUPPER 183 

lobster salad, and champagne, and chat" which 
the poet loved so well. 

Fifty years had passed, and a Ball Supper was 
(and for all I know may still be) much the same. 
*' The bright moments flew on. Suddenly there 
was a mysterious silence in the hall, followed by a 
kind of suppressed stir. Every one seemed to be 
speaking with bated breath, or, if moving, walking 
on tiptoe. It was the supper -hour — 

' Soft hour which wakes the wish and melts the heart.' 

^What a perfect family !' exclaimed Hugo Bohun 
as he extracted a couple of fat little birds from 
their bed of aspic jelly. ^ Everything they do in 
such perfect taste ! How safe you were here 
to have ortolans for supper ! ' " But, after all. 
Ball Suppers are frivolities, and College Suppers 
scarcely more serious ; although a modern bard 
has endeavoured to give them a classical sanction 
by making young Horace at the University of 
Athens thus address himself to his new acquaint- 
ance Balbus : — 

" A friend has sent me half-a-dozen brace 
Of thrush and blackbird from a moor in Thrace. 
These we will have for supper, with a dish 
Of lobster-patties and a cuttle-fish." 

And we may be sure that a meal where Horace 
was host was not unaccompanied by wine and 
song. 

But the Supper which I have in mind is the 



i84 SEEING AND HEARING 

substantial meal which, during the eighteenth 
century and the first quarter of the nineteenth, 
formed the nightly complement to the com- 
paratively early dinner. *' High Tea " such as 
Dickens loved and described — " Bagman's Tea," 
as I was taught to call it, — became popular as 
tea became cheaper. You dined, say, at one, and 
drank tea (and ate accompaniments) at seven. 
But Supper, eaten at nine or ten o'clock, was a 
more substantial affair, and the poison of Tea, so 
much deprecated by our modern Coroners, was 
never suffered to pollute it. In the account of a 
supper in 1770 I have read this exhilarating item: 
^'A turtle was sent as a Present to the Company 
and dress'd in a very high Gout, after the West 
Indian manner ; " and such a dish, eaten at bed- 
time, of course required vinous assistance. A 
forefather of my own noted in his diary for 1788, 
^^ The man who superintends Mrs. Cazalan's of 
New Cavendish Street suppers has a salary of 
^100 a year for his trouble ;" and one may rest 
assured that Mrs. Cazalan's guests drank some- 
thing more exhilarating than tea at her famous 
supper-table. '< Guy Mannering " depicts the habits 
of Scotch Society at the close of the eighteenth 
century ; and Counsellor Pleydell, coming hungry 
from a journey, suggests that a brace of wild 
ducks should be added to the '^ light family 
supper." These he ate ^'without prejudice to a 
subsequent tart," and with these viands he drank 



SUPPER 185 

ale and Burgundy, moralizing thus : '* I love the 
Coena, the supper of the ancients, the pleasant meal 
and social glass that washes out of one's mind 
the cobwebs that business or gloom have been 
spinning in our brains all day." On the point of 
precedent, the Counsellor, or rather Sir Walter 
Scott, is at issue with Lord John Russell, who 
said, in protesting against dinner at eight o'clock : 
^' Some learned persons, indeed, endeavour to 
support this practice by precedent, and quote the 
Roman Supper ; but those suppers were at three 
o'clock in the afternoon, and ought to be a subject 
of contempt instead of imitation in Grosvenor 
Square." Supper at three in the afternoon ! I 
must leave this startHng statement to the investiga- 
tions of Dryasdust. At the same period as that 
at which the Whig Essayist, not yet statesman, 
was protesting against late dinners, Sydney Smith 
was bewailing the effects of supper on the mind 
and temper : — 

<' My friend sups late ; he eats some strong 
soup, then a lobster, then some tart, and he dilutes 
these esculent varieties with wine. The next day 
I call upon him. He is going to sell his house in 
London and retire into the country. He is 
alarmed for his eldest daughter's health. His ex- 
penses are hourly increasing, and nothing but a 
timely retreat can save him from ruin. All this 
is lobster ; and, when over-excited nature has had 
time to manage this testaceous incumbrance, the 



i86 SEEING AND HEARING 

daughter recovers, the finances are in good order, 
and every rural idea is effectually excluded from 
the mind." 

I take due note of the word winej but I believe 
it was usually mixed with water. Of Mr. Pitt, 
not a model of abstemiousness, it is recorded that 
he drank ^^ a good deal of port wine and water at 
supper " ; and Mr. Woodhouse, whom his worst 
enemy never accused of excess, recommended Mrs. 
Goddard to have *' half a glass of wine, a small 
half-glass, in a tumbler of water," as an accom- 
paniment to the minced chicken and scalloped 
oysters. Dr. Kitchener, who was a practising 
physician as well as a writer on Gastronomy, re- 
commended for Supper '' a Biscuit, or a Sandwich, 
or a bit of Cold Fowl, and a Glass of Beer, or 
Wine, and Toast and Water " ; or for '^ such as 
dine very late. Gruel or a little Bread and Cheese, 
or Powdered Cheese, and a glass of Beer." They 
vaunt that medicine is a progressive science, but 
where is the practitioner to-day who would ven- 
ture on these heroic prescriptions of 1825 ? 

I am accused of quoting too often from Lord 
Beaconsfield ; and, though I demur to the word 
^'too/' I admit that I quote from him very often, 
because no writer whom I know scanned so care- 
fully and noted so exactly the social phenomena 
of the time in which he lived. Here is his 
description of Supper in the year 1835 : — 

*^When there were cards there was always a 



SUPPER 187 

little supper — a lobster, and a roasted potato, 
and that sort of easy thing, with curious drinks ; 
and, on fitting occasions, a bottle of champagne 
appeared." 

The Suppers cooked by the illustrious Ude at 
Crockford's Gaming House (now the Devonshire 
Club) were famous for their luxurious splendour ; 
and, being free to all comers, w^ere used as baits 
to inveigle ingenuous Youth into the Gambling- 
room ; for you could scarcely eat a man's supper 
night after night and never give him his chance 
of revenge. But Suppers to be eaten amid the 
frantic excitements of a Gaming House were, 
of necessity, rather stimulating than substantial. 
For substantial Suppers we must turn to the life 
of a class rather less exalted than that which 
lost its fortune at ** Crocky's. Dickens's Suppers, 
which may be taken to represent the supping 
habits of the Middle Class in 1837, ^^^ substantial 
enough, but rather unappetizing. Old Mr. Wardle, 
though the most hospitable of men, only gave Mr. 
Pickwick '^ a plentiful portion of a gigantic round 
of cold beef " — which most people would think an 
indigestible supper. Mrs. Bardell's system was 
even more culpable, according to Dr. Wynn 
Westcott, for she gave her friends a little warm 
supper of '^ Petitoes and Toasted Cheese," with " a 
quiet cup of tea." I do not exactly know what 
petitoes are, but I am sure that when stewed in 
tea they must be poisonous. When Mr. and Mrs. 



i88 SEEING AND HEARING 

Kenwigs, in honour of their wedding-day, made a 
supper for their uncle, the Collector, they arranged 
the feast more hygienically, for their " pair of 
boiled fowls, large piece of pork, apple-pie, potatoes, 
and greens " were reinforced by a bowl of punch ; 
and there is a quite delicious supper in the '* Old 
Curiosity Shop," where a stew, worthy to rank 
with that which Meg Merrilies forced on the re- 
luctant Dominie, is washed down with a pint of 
mulled ale. 

Thackeray, though he excelled at a Dinner, knew 
also, at least in his earlier and Bohemian days, 
what was meant by a Supper. Mr. Archer, the 
journalist in " Pendennis," who was so fond of 
vaunting his imaginary acquaintance with great 
people, thus described his evening repast at Apsley 
House : — 

^'The Duke knows what I like, and says to the 
Groom of the Chambers : ^ Martin, you will have 
some cold beef, not too much done, and a pint 
bottle of Pale Ale, and some brown Sherry ready 
in my study as usual.' The Duke doesn't eat 
supper himself, but he likes to see a man enjoy a 
hearty meal, and he knows that I dine early." 

But all this is fifty years ago and more. Do 
people eat supper nowadays ? Of course the 
young and frivolous eat ball-suppers, and supper 
after the Theatre is a recognized feature of 
London life. But does any one eat supper in his 
own house ? To be sure, a tray of wine and 



SUPPER 189 

water still appears in some houses just as the party 
is breaking up, and it is called a '' Supper Tray," 
but is only the thin and pallid ghost of what was 
once a jolly meal. 

One more form of Supper remains to be re- 
corded. In the circles in which I was reared it 
was customary to observe one day in the year 
as a kind of Festival of the Church Missionary 
Society or the Society for the Propagation of the 
Gospel, according as the principles of the Incum- 
bent were Low or High. The arrangements com- 
prised a special service in church, with a sermon 
by that mysterious stranger '* the Deputation from 
the Parent Society " ; an evening meeting in the 
Town Hall; and a supper at the Rectory or the 
Squire's house. Bidden to such a festival, a friend 
of the Missionary cause wrote thus to the lady 
who had invited him : *' I greatly regret that I 
cannot attend the service, and I very much fear 
that I shall not be in time for the meeting. But, 
D.V., I will be with you at Supper." 



XXVI 

INNS AND HOTELS 

<< Anchovies and Sack after Supper " was honest 
Falstaff's notion of an apt sequence. But An- 
chovies, even in their modern extension of ^^ Hors 
d'CEuvres," will not make a chapter ; and Sack, in 
the form of Sherry, has been exhaustively dis- 
cussed. I must therefore betake myself from 
Falstaff to Touchstone, whose enumeration of 
'^ Dinners and Suppers and Sleeping-hours " may 
serve my present need. 

Where to dine ? Where to sup ? Where to 
sleep ? Momentous questions these ; and at this 
instant they are in the thoughts and on the lips of 
thousands of my fellow-creatures as they journey 
through or towards London. October in London 
is a season with marked and special characteristics. 
Restaurants are crowded; Bond Street is blocked 
by shopping ladies ; seats at the theatre must be 
booked ten days in advance. 

This October *' Season " is the product of many 

forces. The genuine Londoners, who have been 

away, for health or sport or travel, in August and 

190 



INNS AND HOTELS 191 

September now come back with a rush, and hasten 
to make up for their long exile by feverish activity 
in the pursuit of pleasure. But the Londoners 
by no means have the town to themselves. The 
Country Cousins are present in great force. They 
live laborious but delightful days in examining 
the winter fashions ; they get all their meals at 
Prince's or the Carlton ; and they go to the 
play every night. To these must be added the 
Americans, who, having shot our grouse and 
stalked our deer and drunk of our medicated 
springs, are now passing through London on their 
way to Liverpool. As a rule, they buy their 
clothes in Paris, and leave the products of Bond 
Street and Grafton Street to the British con- 
sumer. But their propensity to Theatre-parties 
and Suppers endears them to managers and 
restaurant-keepers ; and on Sunday they can be 
detected at St. Paul's or the Abbey, rendering the 
hymns with that peculiar intonation for which 
Chaucer's ^'Prioresse" was so justly admired. 
Even a few belated French and German tourists 
are still wandering disconsolately among ^'the 
sheddings of the pining umbrage " in the parks, or 
gazing with awe at the grim front of Buckingham 
Palace. Where do all these pilgrims stay ? We 
know where they dine and sup ; but where do 
they spend what Touchstone called their ^^ sleep- 
ing-hours " ? I only know that they do not spend 
them in Inns, for Inns as I understand the word 



192 SEEING AND HEARING 

have ceased to exist. They went out with '^The 
Road." 

It has been remarked by not unfriendly critics 
that the author of these quiet meditations seems 
to live a good deal in the past, and people in 
whom the chronological sense is missing are apt 
to think me a great deal older than I am. Thus 
when I have recalled among my earliest recollec- 
tions the fire which destroyed Covent Garden 
Theatre (in 1856), I have been thought to be 
babbling of Drury Lane, which was burnt down 
in 181 2 ; and so, when I say that in early life I 
travelled a great deal upon the Road, I shall 
probably be accused of having been born before 
railways were invented. What is true enough is 
that a prejudice against railways lingered long 
after they were in general use ; some people 
thought them dangerous, some undignified, and 
I believe that there were some who even thought 
them wicked because they are not mentioned in 
the Bible. ^' I suppose you have heard of Lady 
Vanilla's trip from Birmingham ? " says Lady 
Marney in ^^ Sybil." ^^ Have you not, indeed ? 
She came up with Lady Laura, and two of the 
most gentlemanlike men sitting opposite her ; 
never met, she says, two more intelligent men. 
She begged one of them at Wolverhampton to 
change seats with her, and he was most politely 
willing to comply with her wishes, only it was 



INNS AND HOTELS 193 

necessary that his companion should move at the 

same time, for they were chained together two 

gentlemen sent to town for picking pockets at 
Shrewsbury races." "A Countess and a felon!" 
said Lord Mowbray. '' So much for public con- 
veyances." To these social perils were added 
terrors of tunnels, terrors of viaducts, terrors of 
fires which would burn you to an ash in your 
locked carriage, terrors of robbers who were sup- 
posed to travel iirst-class for the express purpose 
of chloroforming well-dressed passengers and then 
stealing their watches. Haunted by these and 
similar fears, some old-fashioned people travelled 
by road till well into the 'sixties. From my home 
in the South Midlands we took a whole day 
in getting to London, forty miles off; two to 
Leamington, three to Winchester ; and those who 
still travelled in this leisurely mode were the last 
patrons of the Inn. 

It was generally a broad-browed, solid, com- 
fortable-looking house in the most central part of 
a country town. Not seldom the sign was taken 
from the armorial bearings of the local magnate. 
There were a Landlord and a Landlady, who came 
out bowing when the carriage drove up, and con- 
ducted the travellers to their rooms, while the 
^^ Imperials " were taken down from the roof of 
the carriage. (Could one buy an ''Imperial" 
nowadays if one wanted it ? The most recent 

N 



194 SEEING AND HEARING 

reference to it which I can recall occurs in the 
first chapter of ''Tom Brown's School Days.") 
Very often the rooms of the Inn were distinguished 
not by numbers, but by names or tokens derived 
from the situation, or the furniture, or from some 
famous traveller who had slept in them — the Bow 
Room, the Peacock Room, or the Wellington 
Room. The Landlord had generally been a 
butler, but sometimes a coachman. Anyhow, he 
and his wife had '* lived in the best famiHes " and 
''knew how things ought to be done." The fur- 
niture was solid, dark, and handsome — mahogany 
predominating, here and there relieved with rose- 
wood. There was old silver on the table, and the 
walls were covered with sporting or coaching 
prints, views of neighbouring castles, and portraits 
of the Nobility whom the Landlord had served. 
The bedrooms were dark and stuffy beyond be- 
lief, with bedsteads like classic temples and deep 
feather-beds into which you sank as into a quick- 
sand. The food was like the furniture, heavy and 
handsome. There was " gunpowder tea " — green 
if you asked for it, — luscious cream, and really 
new-laid eggs. The best bottle of claret which I 
ever encountered emerged, quite accidentally, from 
the cellar of a village Inn close to the confluence 
of the Greta and the Tees, in a district hallowed 
by the associations of Rokeby and Mr. Squeers. 
When, next morning, you had paid your bill — 



INNS AND HOTELS 195 

not, as a rule, a light one — the Landlord and 
Lady escorted you to the door, and politely ex- 
pressed a hope that you would honour them on 
your return journey. Then '^ Hey, for the lilt of 
the London road ! " and the Montfort Arms, or 
the Roebuck, or the Marquis of Granby, is only a 
pleasant memory of an unreturning day. 

What in the country was called an Inn was 
called in London a '' Family Hotel." It was 
commonly found in Dover Street, or Albemarle 
Street, or Bolton Street, or some such byway 
of Piccadilly ; and in its aspect, character, and 
general arrangement it was exactly like the country 
Inn, only of necessity darker, dingier, and more 
airless. Respectability, mahogany, and horsehair 
held it in their iron grip. Here county families, 
coming up from the Drawing Room, or the 
Academy, or the Exhibition, or the Derby, spent 
cheerful weeks in summer. Here in the autumn 
they halted on their return from Doncaster or 
Aix. Here the boys slept on their way back 
to Eton or Cambridge ; hither the subaltern 
returned, like a homing pigeon, from India or 
the Cape. 

But the Family Hotel, Hke the Country Inn, 
has seen its day. When the Times was inciting 
the inhabitants of Rome to modernize their city, 
Matthew Arnold, writing in Miss Story's album, 
made airy fun of the suggestion. He represented 



196 SEEING AND HEARING 

^' the TimeSj that bright Apollo," proclaiming salva- 
tion to the '^ armless Cupid " imprisoned in the 
Vatican : — 

" * And what,' cries Cupid, ' will save us ? ' 
Says Apollo : ' Modernize Ro7ne ! 
What inns ! Your streets too, how narrow ! 
Too much of palace and dome ! 

" ' O learn of London, whose paupers 
Are not pushed out by the swells ! 
Wide streets, with fine double trottoirs ; 
And then — the London hotels ! ' '' 

Between the " Inns " of my youth and these 
'^ Hotels " of to-day the difference is so great that 
they can scarcely be recognized as belonging to 
the same family. Under the old dispensation all 
was solid comfort, ponderous respectability, and 
the staid courtesy of the antique world ; under 
the new it is all glare and glitter, show and sham ; 
the morals of the Tuileries and the manners of 
Greenwich Fair. The building is something 
between a palace and a barrack, with a hall of 
marble, a staircase of alabaster, a winter garden 
full of birds and fountains, and a band which 
deafens you while you eat your refined but ex- 
iguous dinner. Among these sumptuosities the 
visitor is no longer a person but a number. As 
a number he is received by the gigantic ^' Suisse " 
who, resplendent in green and gold, watches the 
approach to the palace ; as a number he is 



INNS AND HOTELS 197 

registered by a dictatorial " Secretary/' enshrined 
in a Bureau ; as a number he is shot up, Hke a 
parcel, to his airy lodgings on the seventh floor ; 
as a number he orders his meals ; as a number 
he pays his bill. The whole business is a micro- 
cosm of State Socialism : Bureaucracy is supreme, 
and the Individual is lost in the Machine. But, 
though the courtesies and the humanities and even 
the decencies of the old order have vanished so 
completely, the exactions remain much the same 
as they were. There is, indeed, no courtly land- 
lord to bow, like a plumper Sir Charles Grandison, 
over the silver salver on which you have laid 
your gold ; but there are gilt-edged porters, and 
moustached lift-men, and a regiment of buttony 
boys who float round the departing guest with 
well-timed assiduity ; and the Suisse at the door, 
as he eyes our modest luggage with contemptuous 
glare, looks quite prepared, if need be, to extort 
his guerdon by physical force. 

The British Inn, whatever were its shortcomings 
in practice, has been glorified in. some of the best 
verse and best prose in the English language. It 
will, methinks, be a long time before even the 
most impressionable genius of the ^' Bodley Head " 
pens a panegyric of the London Hotel. 



XXVII 
TRAVEL 

The October Season, of which I lately spoke, is 
practically over. ^' The misty autumn sunlight 
and the sweeping autumn wind " are yielding 
place to cloud and storm. In a week's time 
London will have assumed its winter habit, 
and already people are settling down to their 
winter way of living. The last foreigner has fled. 
The Country Cousins have finished their shopping 
and have returned to the pursuit of the Pheasant 
and the Fox. The true Londoners — the people 
who come back to town for the '^ first note of the 
Muffin-bell and retreat to the country for the 
first note of the Nightingale " — have resumed the 
placidity of their normal life. Dinner-parties have 
hardly begun, but there are plenty of little 
luncheons ; the curtains are drawn about four, 
and there are three good hours for Bridge before 
one need think of going to dress for dinner. And 
now, just when London is beginning to wear once 
again its most attractive aspect, at once sociable 
and calm, some perverse people, disturbers of the 



TRAVEL 199 

public peace; must needs throw everything into 
confusion by going abroad. 

Their motives are many and various. With 
some it is health : " I feel that I must have a 
little sunshine, I have been so rheumatic all this 
autumn," or '< My doctor tells me that, with my 
tendency to bronchitis, the fogs are really danger- 
ous." With some it is sheer restlessness : '^ Well, 
you see, we were here all the summer, except just 
Whitsuntide and Ascot and Goodwood ; so we 
have had about enough of London. And our 
home in Loamshire is so fearfully lonely in winter 
that it quite gets on my nerves. So I think a 
little run will do us all good ; and we shall be 
back by the New Year, or February at latest." 
With some, again, economy is the motive power ; 
<^ What with two sons to allowance, and two still 
at school ; and one girl to be married at Easter, 
and one just coming out, as well as a most 
expensive governess for the young ones, I assure 
you it is quite difficult to make two ends meet. 
We have got an excellent offer for Eaton Place 
from November to May, and some friends on the 
Riviera have repeatedly asked us to pay them a 
long visit ; and, when that's done, one can live en 
pension at Montreux for next to nothing." Others 
are lured abroad by the love of gambling, though 
this is not avowed : '' I do so love Monte Carlo — 
not the gambling, but the air, and, even if one does 
lose a franc or two at the tables, I always say 



200 SEEING AND HEARING 

that we should lose much more at home, with 
Christmas presents, and Workhouse Treats, and 
all those tiresome things one has to do." 

It is not a joke — for I never joke about religion 
— it is a literal fact that in my youth the prophecy 
in the Book of Daniel that ^' Many shall run to 
and fro, and knowledge shall be increased " was 
interpreted as pointing to an enlargement of the 
human mind through increased facilities of travel. 
I do not guarantee the exegesis, but I note the 
fact. A hundred years ago, if parents wished to 
enlarge their son's understanding by sending him 
on the ^* Grand Tour " of Europe, they set aside 
twelve months for the fulfilment of their purpose. 
Young Hopeful set out in a travelling-carriage 
with a tutor (or Bear-Leader), a Doctor, and a 
Valet. The Bear-Leader's was a recognized and 
lucrative profession. In a diary for 1788, which 
lies before me as I write, I read : '' Mr. Coxe, the 
traveller, has been particularly lucky as a Pupil- 
Leader about Europe. After Lord Herbert, he 
had Mr. Whitbred at ;^8oo per ann., and now 
has Mr. Portman, with ;£iooo per ann." Patrick 
Brydone, scholar, antiquary, and virtuoso^ whose 
daughter married the second Earl of Minto, was 
** Pupil-Leader " (or Bear-Leader) to William Beck- 
ford. Sydney Smith was dug out of his curacy on 
Salisbury Plain in order to act as Bear-Leader to 
the grandfather of the present Lord St. Aldwyn. 
Charles Richard Sumner, who, as last of the 



TRAVEL 201 

Prince-Bishops of Winchester, drew ^40,000 a 
year for forty years, began Hfe as Bear-Leader to 
Lord Mount-Charles, eldest son of that Lady 
Conyngham whom George IV. admired ; and he 
owed his first preferment in the Church to the 
amiable complaisance with which he rescued his 
young charge from a matrimonial entanglement. 
That was early in the nineteenth century ; but 
forty years later the Bear-Leader was still an 
indispensable adjunct to the Grand Tour of 
Illustrious Youth. The late Duke of Argyll has 
told us how he made his travels sandwiched inside 
his father's chariot between his preceptor and 
his physician. When the Marquis of Montacute 
made his pilgrimage to the Holy Land he was 
even more liberally attended ; for, in addition to 
his Bear-Leader, Colonel Grouse, he took his 
father's doctor, Mr Groby, to avert or cure the 
fevers, and his father's chaplain, the Rev. Mr. 
Bernard, to guide his researches into the theology 
of Syria. Perhaps Lord Montacute existed only 
in Lord Beaconsfield's rich imagination ; but 
Thackeray, who never invented but always de- 
scribed what he saw, drew a delightful portrait of 
'^ the Rev. Baring Leader," who, *' having a great 
natural turn and liking towards the aristocracy," 
consented to escort Viscount Talboys when that 
beer-loving young nobleman made his celebrated 
journey down the Rhine. 

But, though a special divinity always hedged, 



202 SEEING AND HEARING 

as it still hedgeS; the travels of an Eldest Son, the 
more modest journeyings of his parents were not 
accomplished without considerable form and fuss. 
Lord and Lady Proudflesh or Mr. and Mrs. Gold- 
more travelled all over Europe in their own 
carriage. It was planted bodily on the deck of 
the steamer, so that its privileged occupants could 
endure the torments of the crossing in dignified 
seclusion ; and, when once the solid shore of the 
Continent was safely reached, it was drawn by an 
endless succession of post-horses, ridden by pos- 
tillions, with the valet and maid (like those who 
pertained to Sir Leicester and Lady Dedlock) 
*^ affectionate in the rumble." The inside of the 
carriage was a miracle of ingenuity. Space was 
economized with the most careful art, and all the 
appliances of travel — looking-glasses and luncheon- 
baskets, lamps and maps, newspapers and books — 
were bestowed in their peculiar and appropriate 
corners. I possess a ^' dining equipage " which 
made the tour of Europe not once but often in 
the service of a Diplomatist. It is shaped some- 
thing like a large egg, and covered with shagreen. 
It contains a tumbler, a sandwich-box, and a 
silver-handled knife, fork, and spoon ; the handle 
of each of these tools unscrews, and in their 
hollow interiors the Diplomatist carried his salt, 
sugar, and pepper. On the roof of the carriage 
was the more substantial luggage. A travelling- 
bath, though not unknown, was rather an ex- 



TRAVEL 203 

ceptional luxury, and, according to our modern 
notions, it was painfully small. A silver tub which 
sufficed for the ablutions of the great Duke of 
Marlborough through the campaignswhich changed 
the face of Europe now serves as a rose-bowl at 
the banquets of Spencer House. 

The trunks, which were strapped to the roof of 
the travelling-carriage, were of a peculiar form — 
very shallow, and so shaped as to fit into one 
another and occupy every inch of space. These 
were called Imperials, and just now I referred to 
Tom Hughes's undeserved strictures on them. 
The passage fits neatly into our present subject : '' I 
love vagabonds, only I prefer poor to rich ones. 
Couriers and ladies' maids, imperials and travelling- 
carriages, are an abomination unto me — I cannot 
away with them." To me, on the contrary, the 
very word " Imperial " (when divested of political 
associations) is pleasant. It appeals to the historic 
sense. It carries us back to Napoleon's campaigns, 
and to that wonderful house on wheels — his tra- 
velling-carriage — now enshrined at Madame Tus- 
saud's. It even titillates the gastronomic instinct 
by recalling that masterly method of cooking a 
fowl which bears the name of Marengo. The 
great Napoleon had no notion of fighting his 
battles on an empty stomach, so, wherever he 
was, a portable kitchen, in the shape of a travel- 
ling-carriage, was close at hand. The cook and 
his marmiions travelled inside, with the appliances 



204 SEEING AND HEARING 

for making a charcoal fire at a moment's notice, 
while the Imperials on the roof contained the due 
supply of chickens, eggs, bread, and Bordeaux. In 
the preparation of a meal under such conditions 
time was money — nay, rather, it was Empire. 
The highest honours were bestowed on the most 
expeditious method, and the method called after 
Marengo took exactly twenty minutes. 

Here is testimony much more recent. Lady 
Dorothy Nevill, in the volume of " Reminiscences " 
which she has lately given to the world, thus 
describes her youthful journeys between her 
London and her Norfolk homes : ^^ It took us two 
long days to get to Wolterton, and the cost must 
have been considerable. We went in the family 
coach with four post-horses, whilst two ' fourgons ' 
conveyed the luggage." But travelling abroad 
was a still more majestic ceremonial : " We were 
a large party— six of ourselves, as well as two 
maids, a footman, and French cook ; nor must I 
forget a wonderful courier, covered with gold 
and braid. He preceded our cavalcade and an- 
nounced the imminent arrival of a great English 
Milord and his suite. We had two fourgons to 
hold the hatterie de cuisine and our six beds, 
which had to be unpacked and made up every 
night. We had, besides the family coach and a 
barouche, six saddle horses, and two attendant 
grooms." 

Travel in those brave days of old was a dignified, 



TRAVEL 205 

a leisurely, and a comfortable process. How 
different is Travel in these degenerate times ! 
For the young man rejoicing in his strength it 
means, as Tom Hughes said forty years ago, 
" getting over a couple of thousand miles for three- 
pound-ten ; going round Ireland, with a return 
ticket, in a fortnight ; dropping your copy of 
Tennyson on the top of a Swiss mountain, or 
pulling down the Danube in an Oxford racing- 
boat." For those who have reached maturer 
years it may mean a couple of nights in Paris, just 
to see the first performance of a new play and to 
test the merits of the latest restaurant, or it may 
mean a week in New York to study the bearings 
of the Presidential election and to gather fresh 
views of the Silver Question. Dr. Lunn kindly 
invites the more seriously minded to a Conference 
at Grindelwald, where we can combine the delights 
of Alpine scenery and undenominational religion ; 
and *^ the son of a well-known member of the 
House of Lords" offers to conduct us person- 
ally through *^A Lion and Rhinoceros Hunting 
Party in Somaliland," or ''A Scientific Expedition 
to Central Africa, to visit the supposed cradle 
of the human race and the site of the Garden of 
Eden." Nothing of Travelling-carriages and Im- 
perials here ! No " maid and valet affectionate 
in the rumble." All the pomp and circumstance, 
all the ease and calm, of Travel have vanished, 
and with them all sense of independence and 



2o6 SEEING AND HEARING 

responsibility. The modern traveller is shot like 
a bullet through a tunnel, or hauled like a parcel 
up a hill. He certainly sees the world at very 
little cost, but he sees it under wonderfully un- 
comfortable conditions. 



XXVIII 

ACCOMPLISHMENTS 

A PICTORIAL critic, commending the water-colour 
painting of Mr. Arthur Rich, says that, after 
examining his firm and serious work, ^' it is im- 
possible to think that there is anything trivial in 
the art of Aquarelle— that it is, as has been said, 
* a thing Aunts do.' " 

A thing Aunts do, I linger on the words, for 
they suggest deep thoughts. Many and mysterious 
are the tricks of language — not least so the subtle 
law by which certain relationships inevitably sug- 
gest pecuUar traits. Thus the Grandmother stands 
to all time as the type of benevolent feebleness ; 
the Stepmother was branded by classical antiquity 
as Unjust ; and Thackeray's Mrs. Gashleigh and 
Mrs. Chuff are the typical Mothers-in-Law. The 
Father is commonly the '' Heavy Father " of fiction 
and the drama. The Mother is always quoted 
with affection, as in ''Mother-wit," our Mother- 
country, and our Mother-tongue. ''A Brother," 
ever since the days of Solomon, ''is born for 
adversity," and a Brother-officer implies a loyal 
friend. A Sister is the type of Innocence, with 



207 



2o8 SEEING AND HEARING 

just a faint tinge or nuance of pitying contempt, 
as when the Vainglorious Briton speaks of the 
^' Sister Country " across St. George's Channel, or 
the hubristic Oxonian sniggers at the ^' Sister Uni- 
versity " of Cambridge. Eldest and Younger Sons 
again, as I have before now had occasion to point 
out, convey two quite different sets of ideas, and 
this discrepancy has not escaped the notice of the 
social Poet, who observes that — 

" Acres and kine and tenements and sheep 
Enrich the Eldest, while the Younger Sons 
Monopolize the talents and the duns." 

^^ My Uncle," in colloquial phrase, signifies the 
merchant who transacts his business under the 
sign of the Three Golden Balls ; and to these 
expressive relationships must be added Auntship. 
*' A thing Aunts do," says the pictorial critic ; and 
the contumelious phrase is not of yesterday, for 
in 1829 a secularly-minded friend complained 
that young Mr. William Gladstone, then an Under- 
graduate at Christ Church, had " mixed himself 
up so much with the St. Mary Hall and Oriel set, 
who are really, for the most part, only fit to live 
with maiden aunts and keep tame rabbits." To 
paint in water-colour and to keep tame rabbits 
are pursuits which to the superficial gaze have 
little in common, though both are, or were, 
characteristic of Aunts, and both are, in some 
sense, accomplishments, demanding natural taste, 



ACCOMPLISHMENTS 209 

acquired skill, patience, care, a delicate touch, and 
a watchful eye. Perhaps these were the particular 
accomplishments in which the traditional Aunt 
''specialized," though she had never heard that 
bad word ; but, if she chose to diffuse her energies 
more widely, the world was all before her where to 
choose ; and, by a singular reversal of the law of 
progress, there were more "accomplishments" to 
solicit her attention a hundred years ago than there 
are to-day. 

When the most fascinating of all heroines, Di 
Vernon, anticipated posterity by devoting her 
attention to politics, field sports, and classical liter- 
ature, she enumerated, among the more feminine 
accomplishments which she had discarded, " sew- 
ing a tucker, working cross-stitch, and making a 
pudding " ; and she instanced, among the symbols 
of orthodox femininity "a shepherdess wrought in 
worsted, a broken-backed spinet, a lute with three 
strings, rock-work, shell-work, and needle-work." 
We clear the century with a flying leap, and 
find ourselves in the company of a model matron, 
with surroundings substantially unchanged : " Mrs. 
Bayham-Badger was surrounded in the drawing- 
room by various objects indicative of her painting 
a little, playing the piano a little, playing the guitar 
a little, playing the harp a little, singing a little, 
working a little, reading a little, writing poetry a 
little, and botanizing a little. If I add to the little 
Hst of her accomplishments that she rouged a little, 
I do not mean that there was any harm in it." 

O 



2 10 SEEING AND HEARING 

Miss Volumnia Dedlock's accomplishments, though 
belonging to the same period, were slightly dif- 
ferent : ^^ Displaying in early life a pretty talent 
for cutting ornaments out of coloured paper, and 
also singing to the guitar in the Spanish tongue 
and propounding French conundrums in country 
houses, she passed the twenty years of her exist- 
ence between twenty and forty in a sufficiently 
agreeable manner. Lapsing then out of date, and 
being considered to bore mankind by her vocal 
performances in the Spanish language, she retired 
to Bath." Perhaps she had been educated by 
Miss Monflathers, ^^who was at the head of the 
head Boarding and Day Establishment in the 
town," and whose gloss on the didactic ditty of 
the Busy Bee so confounded the emissary from 
the Waxworks. 

*'In books, or work, or healthful play 

is quite right as far as genteel children are con- 
cerned, and in their case ' work ' means painting on 
velvet, fancy needle-work, or embroidery." Do 
even Aunts paint on velvet, or cut ornaments out 
of coloured paper, in this ^* so-called Twentieth 
Century " ? I know no more pathetic passage in 
the Literature of Art than that in which Mrs. 
Gaskell enumerated Miss Matty's qualifications for 
the work of teaching : — 

" I ran over her accomplishments. Once upon 
a time I had heard her say she could play 'Ah ! 
vous dirai-je maman ? ' on the piano ; but that 



1: 
1 



ACCOMPLISHMENTS 211 

was long, long ago ; that faint shadow of musical 
acquirement had died out years before. She had 
also once been able to trace patterns very nicely 
for muslin embroidery, but that was her nearest 
approach to the accomplishment of drawing, and 
I did not think it would go very far. Miss 
Matty's eyes were failing her, and I doubted if 
she could discover the number of threads in a 
worsted-work pattern, or rightly appreciate the 
dilferent shades required for Queen Adelaide's 
face, in the loyal wool-work now fashionable in 
Cranford." 

The allusion to Queen Adelaide's face fixes the 
narrative between 1820 and 1830, and George Eliot 
was depicting the same unenlightened period when 
she described the accomplishments provided by 
Ladies' Schools as '^ certain small tinklings and 
smearings." Probably all of us can recall an Aunt 
who tinkled on the piano, or a First Cousin once 
Removed who smeared on Bristol Board. Lady 
Dorothy Nevill, whose invincible force and ever- 
green memory carry down into the reign of King 
Edward VIL the traditions of Queen Charlotte's 
Court, is a singularly accomplished Aunt, and she 
has just made this remarkable confession : '' At 
different times I have attempted many kinds of 
amateur work, including book illumination, leather- 
working, wood-carving, and, of late years, a kind 
of old-fashioned paper-work, which consists in 
arranging little slips of coloured paper into deco- 
rative designs, as was done at the end of the 



212 SEEING AND HEARING 

eighteenth century. When completed, this work 
is made up into boxes, trays, or mounts for 
pictures." Surely in this accomplishment Miss 
Volumnia Dedlock lives again. And then Lady 
Dorothy, lapsing into reminiscent vein, makes 
this rather half-hearted apology for the domestic 
artistry of bygone days : ^^ Years ago ladies used to 
spend much more of their time in artistic v^rork of 
some kind or other, for there were not then the 
many distractions which exist to-day. Indeed, in 
the country some sort of work was a positive 
necessity ; and though, no doubt, by far the 
greater portion of what was done was absolutely 
hideous, useless, and horrible, yet it served the 
purpose of passing away many an hour which 
otherwise would have been given up to insufferable 
boredom." 

Yes, the fashions of the world succeed one 
another in perpetual change ; but Boredom is 
eternally the enemy, and the paramount necessity 
of escaping from it begets each year some new and 
strange activity. The Aunt no longer paints in 
water-colours or keeps tame rabbits, flattens ferns 
in an album, or traces crude designs with a hot 
poker on a deal board. To-day she urges the 
impetuous bicycle, or, in more extreme cases, 
directs the murderous motor j lectures on politics 
or platonics, Icelandic art, or Kamschatkan liter- 
ature. Perhaps she has a Cause or a Mission 
pleads for the legal enforcement of Vegetarian 
Boots, or tears down the knocker of a Statesman 



ACCOMPLISHMENTS 213 

who refuses her the suffrage. Perhaps her en- 
thusiasms are less altruistic, and then she may 
pillage her friends at Bridge, or supply the New 
York Sewer with^^^a weekly column of Classy Cut- 
tings. "Are 'you the Daily Mail?" incautiously 
chirped a literary lady to an unknown friend who 
had rung her up on the telephone. ^' No, I'm not, 
but I always thought you were," was the reply ; 
and so, in truth, she was. 



XXIX 

CIDER 

An ingenious correspondent of mine has lately 
been visiting the Brewers' Exhibition, and has 
come away from it full of Cider. I mean " full " 
in the intellectual rather than the physical sense 
— full of the subject, though unversed in the 
beverage. He reminds me that Charles Lamb had 
his catalogue of ^' Books which are no books — 
biblia a-bibliuy' among which he reckoned Court 
Calendars, Directories, Pocket-books, Draught- 
boards bound and lettered on the back, Scientific 
Treatises, Almanacs, Statutes at Large, and Paley's 
Moral Philsophy. My correspondent suggests that, 
in a like spirit, a Brewer must have his catalogue 
of Drinks which are no drinks — pota a-pota — and 
that among them, if only the secret thoughts of his 
heart were known, he must reckon Cider. Yet at 
the Brewers' Exhibition there was a Literature of 
Cider, and that innocent-sounding beverage was 
quoted at a price per bottle at which Claret is not 
ashamed to be sold. That the men of Malt and 
Hops should thus officially recognize the existence 
of fermented apple-juice strikes my friend as an 

Economy of Truth ; a suppression, or at least an 

214 



CIDER 215 

evasion, of a deep-seated and absolute belief. They 
cannot really regard Cider as a drink, and yet they 
give it a place alongside that manly draught which 
has made old England what she is. I, on the other 
hand, who always like to regard the actions of my 
fellow-men in the most favourable light, prefer to 
think that the Brewers have been employing some 
portion of that enforced leisure, which the decay 
of their industry must have brought, in studying 
English literature, and that they have thus been 
made acquainted with the name and fame of Cider. 

Biblia a-biblia set me thinking of Lamb, and 
when once one begins recalling "Elia" one drifts 
along, in a kind of waking reverie, from one 
pleasant fantasy to another. Biblia a-biblia led 
me on to '' Dream Children," and Dream Children 
to Dream Riddles — a reverie of my own child- 
hood, when we used to ask one another a pleasing 
conundrum which played prettily on In Cider and 
Inside her. But it made light of an illustrious 
name and had better be forgotten. 

Few, I fear, are the readers of John Philips, but, 
if such there be, they will no doubt recall the only 
poem which, as far as I know, has ever been de- 
voted to the praise of Apple-wine. Philips was a 
patriotic son of Herefordshire, and in Hereford 
Cathedral he lies buried under bunches of marble 
apples which commemorate his poetical achieve- 
ment : — 

" What soil the apple loves, what care is due 
To Orchats, timeliest when to press the fruits, 



2i6 SEEING AND HEARING 

Thy gift, Pomona ! in Miltonian verse, 
Adventurous, I presume to sing ; of verse 
Nor skiird nor studious ; but my native soil 
Invites me, and the theme as yet unsung." 

^' Orchats " is good ; but how far these Hnes can 
be justly called Miltonian is a question which my 
readers can decide for themselves. At any rate, 
the poem contains more than four thousand lines 
exactly like them, and they had the remarkable 
fortune to be translated into Italian under the 
title of " II Sidro." Philips was a Cavalier in all 
his tastes and sympathies : but even the Puritans, 
whom he so cordially detested, admitted the merits 
of Cider. Macaulay, with his characteristic love of 
irrelevant particularity, insists on the fact that, 
through all the commotions of the Great Rebellion 
and the Civil War, '^ the cream overflowed the pails 
of Cheshire and the apple-juice foamed in the 
presses of Herefordshire." Nor was it only in his 
purple prose that the great rhetorician glorified the 
juice of the apple. Many a reader who has for- 
gotten all about John Philips will recall Macaulay's 
rhymes on the garrulous country squire who had a 
habit of detaining people by the button, and who 
was especially addicted to the society of Bishops: — 

" His Grace Archbishop Manners-Sutton 
Could not keep on a single button. 
As for Right Reverend John of Chester, 
His waistcoats open at the breasts are. 
Our friend has filled a mighty trunk 
With trophies torn from Bishop Monk, 



CIDER 217 

And he has really tattered foully 
The vestments of good Bishop Howley. 
No buttons could I late discern on 
The garments of Archbishop Vernon, 
And never had his fingers mercy 
Upon the garb of Bishop Percy ; 
While buttons fly from Bishop Ryder 
Like corks that spring from bottled cyder." 

From Macaulay and bottled Cyder (or Cider) the 
transition is easy to that admirable delineator of 
life and manners, Mrs. Sherwood ; she was pretty 
much a contemporary of Macaulay's, and was a 
native of Worcestershire, which in its Cider-bearing 
qualities is not far removed from Herefordshire, 
beloved of Philips. Few but fit is the audience to 
which Mrs. Sherwood still appeals ; yet they who 
were nurtured on '^The Fairchild Family" still 
renew their youth as they peruse the adventures of 
Lucy, Emily, and little Henry : '^The farmer and 
his wife, whose name was Freeman, were not 
people who lived in the fear of God, neither did 
they bring up their children well ; on which ac- 
count Mr. Fairchild had often forbidden Lucy, 
Emily, and Henry to go to their house." However, 
go they did, as soon as their parents' backs were 
turned ; and Mrs. Freeman " gave them each a large 
piece of cake and something sweet to drink, which, 
she said, would do them good." But it turned out 
to be Cider, and did not do them good, for, '^as 
they were never used to drink anything but water, 
it made them quite drunk for a little while." 



2i8 SEEING AND HEARING 

The mention of Worcestershire as a cider-grow- 
ing county aptly introduces my unfailing friend 
Lord Beaconsfield, for, though he is less precise 
than I could wish in praise of Cider, he com- 
pliments it indirectly in his pretty description 
of ^^ a fair child, long-haired, and blushing like 
a Worcestershire orchard before harvest-time." 
Once, indeed, the lover of Disraelitish romance 
seems to find himself on the track of Cider. 
Harry Coningsby is overtaken by a thunderstorm 
in a forest, and, taking refuge in a sylvan inn, 
makes friends with a mysterious stranger. The 
two travellers agree to dine together, when this 
eminently natural dialogue ensues. '''But Ceres 
without Bacchus,' said Coningsby, ' how does that 
do ? Think you, under this roof, we could invoke 
the god ? ' 

'' ^ Let us swear by his body that we will try,' 
said the stranger. 

" Alas ! the landlord was not a priest of Bacchus. 
But then these enquiries led to the finest Perry in 
the world." If only the Perry had been Cider, 
this quotation had been more apposite ; but the 
themes, though not identical, are cognate. 

We have traced the praise of Cider in poetry and 
in romance, but it also has its place in biography, 
and even in religious biography. One of the most 
delightful portraits of a saint which was ever drawn 
is Mrs. Oliphant's " Life of Edward Irving." In 
the autumn of 1834 — the last autumn of his life — 
that Prophet and man of God made a kind of 



CIDER 219 

apostolic journey through Shropshire, Hereford- 
shire, and Wales. From Kington, in Herefordshire, 
he wrote to his wife : '* My dinner was ham and 
eggs, a cold fowl, an apple tart, and cheese ; a 
tumbler of Cider, and a glass of Sicilian Tokay." 
And he adds a tender reference to *' Ginger Wine 
in a long-necked decanter." It is always satis- 
factory to find the good things of this life not 
reserved exclusively for bad people. 

Sydney Smith, though a Canon of St. Paul's, 
was scarcely a Saint and not at all a Prophet; 
and through the study-windows of his beautiful 
parsonage in Somersetshire, he gazed on the 
glories of the Cider-vintage with an eye more 
mundane than that of Edward Irving. In 1829 he 
wrote from Combe Florey— '^the sacred valley of 
flowers," as he loved to call it : ^M continue to be 
delighted with the country. The harvest is got in 
without any rain. The Cider is such an enormous 
crop that it is sold at ten shillings a hogshead ; so 
a human creature may lose his reason for a penny." 

Cider is, I believe, still drunk at Oxford; and 
memory retains grateful recollections of Cider-cup 
beautiful as a liquid topaz, with a cluster of blue 
flowers floating on its breast. But the Cider-Cellars 
of London— places of, I fear, ill-regulated con- 
viviality—have, as far as 1 know, long since closed 
their doors. Yet they, too, have their secure place 
in literature. The "Young Lion" of the Daily 
Telegraph, who looked forward to succeeding 
Dr. W. H. Russell as War Correspondent of the 



220 SEEING AND HEARING 

Times, thrilled with excitement at the prospect 
of inoculating the Leading Journal with '^the 
divine madness of our new style — the style we 
have formed upon Sala. It blends the airy epi- 
cureanism of the salons of Augustus with the full- 
bodied gaiety of our English Cider Cellar." But 
that was written in 1870, and the style and the 
Cellars alike are things of the past. The official 
historian of Cider excels in that ^' dry light " which 
is the grace of history, and gravely tells us that 
" Cider {Zidevy German) when first made in England 
was called wine." With a proper reluctance to 
commit himself to what is antecedently incredible, 
he adds that ^' the Earl of Manchester, when Am- 
bassador in France (1699), is said to have passed 
off Cider for Wine." It is more plausibly stated 
that in later days the innocuous apple has been 
artfully mingled with the '' foaming grape of 
Eastern France," and has been drunk in England 
as Champagne. The Hock-cup at Buckingham 
Palace is justly vaunted as one of the chief glories 
of our ancient polity. It is certainly the most 
delectable drink that ever refreshed a thirsty soul ; 
and the art of concocting it is a State-Secret of the 
most awful solemnity. But there never was a 
secret which did not sooner or later elude its 
guardians ; and I have heard that a Royal cellarer, 
in an expansive moment, once revealed the spell. 
German Wine and English Cider together constitute 
the Kingly Cup, 

" And, blended, form, with artful strife, 
The strength and harmony of life." 



XXX 

THE GARTER 

"Breathes there a man, with soul so dead, 
Who never to himself hath said 

I should uncommonly like to be a Knight of the 
Garter ? " If such there be, let him forswear this 
column and pass on to the Cotton Market or the 
Education Bill. Here we cater for those in whom 
the historic instinct is combined with picturesque 
sensibility, and who love to trace the stream of 
the national life as it flows through long-descended 
rites. Lord Acton wrote finely of ^' Institutions 
which incorporate tradition and prolong the reign 
of the dead." No institution fulfils this ideal more 
absolutely than the Order of the Garter. One 
need not always "commence with the Deluge"; 
and there is no occasion to consult the lively 
oracles of Mrs. Markham for the story of the 
dropped garter and the chivalrous motto. It is 
enough to remember that the Order links the last 
enchantments of the Middle Age with the Twentieth 
Century, and that for at least four hundred years 
it has played a real, though hidden, part in the 
secret strategy of English Statecraft. 



222 SEEING AND HEARING 

We are told by travellers that the Emperor of 
Lilliput rewarded his courtiers with three fine 
silken threads of about six inches long, one of 
which was blue, one red, and one green. The 
method by which these rewards were obtained 
is thus described by an eye-witness: ^'The Em- 
peror holds a stick in his hands, both ends parallel 
to the horizon, while the candidates, advancing 
one by one, sometimes leap over it, sometimes 
creep under it, backwards and forwards, several 
times, according as the stick is elevated or de- 
pressed. Whoever shows the most agility and 
performs his part best of leaping and creeping is 
rewarded with the blue coloured silk, the next 
with the red, and so on." 

To-day we are not concerned with the red silk, 
wisely invented by Sir Robert Walpole for the 
benefit of those who could not aspire to the blue ; 
nor with the green, which illustrates the continuous 
and separate polity of the Northern Kingdom. 
The blue silk supplies us with all the material we 
shall need. In its wider aspect of the Blue 
Ribbon, it has its secure place in the art, the 
history, and the literature of England; though 
perhaps the Dryasdusts of future ages will be 
perplexed by the Manichaean associations which 
will then have gathered round it. ^'When," they 
will ask, ^' and by what process, did the ensign of 
a high chivalric Order which originated at a 
banquet become the symbol of total abstinence 
from fermented drinks ? " Even so, a high-toned 



THE GARTER 223 

damsel from the State of Maine, regarding the 
Blue Ribbon which girt Lord Granville's white 
waistcoat, congratulated him on the boldness with 
which he displayed his colours, and then shrank 
back in astonished horror as he raised his claret- 
glass to his lips. In one of the prettiest of 
historical novels Amy Robsart is represented as 
examining with childish wonder the various badges 
and decorations which her husband wears, while 
Leicester, amused by her simplicity, explains the 
significance of each. ^'The embroidered strap, as 
thou callest it, around my knee," he said, '^is the 
English Garter, an ornament which Kings are 
proud to wear. See, here is the star which be- 
longs to it, and here is the diamond George, the 
jewel of the Order. You have heard how King 

Edward and the Countess of Salisbury " '' Oh, 

I know all that tale," said the Countess, slightly 
blushing, "and how a lady's garter became the 
proudest badge of English chivalry." 

There are certain families which may be styled 
'* Garter Families," so constant — almost unbroken 
— has been the tradition that the head of the 
family should be a Knight Companion of the Most 
Noble Order. Such is the House of Beaufort ; is 
there not a great saloon at Badminton walled 
entirely with portraits of Dukes of Beaufort in 
their flowing mantles of Garter-Blue ? Such is 
the House of Bedford, which has worn the Garter 
from the reign of Henry VIII. till now; such the 
House of Norfolk, which contrived to retain its 



224 SEEING AND HEARING 

Garters, though it often lost its head, in times of 
civil commotion. The Dukes of Devonshire, again, 
have been habitual Garter-wearers ; and the four- 
teenth Earl of Derby, though he refused a duke- 
dom, was proud to accept an extra Garter (raising 
the number of Knights above the statutory twenty- 
five), which Queen Victoria gave him as a consola- 
tion for his eviction from the Premiership in 1859. 
Punchy then, as now, no respecter of persons, 
had an excellent cartoon of a blubbering child, to 
whom a gracious lady soothingly remarks, ^* Did 
he have a nasty tumble, then ? Here's something 
pretty for him to play with." The Percys, again, 
were pre-eminently a Garter Family ; sixteen heads 
of the house have worn Blue silk. So far as the 
male line was concerned, they came to an end in 
1670. The eventual heiress of the house married 
Sir Hugh Smithson, who acquired the estates and 
assumed the name of the historic Percys. Having, 
in virtue of this great alliance, been created Earl 
of Northumberland, Sir Hugh begged George III. 
to give him the Garter. When the King demurred, 
the aspirant exclaimed, in the bitterness of his 
heart, *' I am the first Northumberland who ever 
was refused the Garter." To which the King re- 
plied, not unreasonably, ^'And you are the first 
Smithson who ever asked for it." However, there 
are forms of political pressure to which even Kings 
must yield, and people who had *' borough in- 
fluence " could generally get their way when 
George III, wanted some trustworthy votes in 
the House of Commons. So Sir Hugh Smithson 



THE GARTER 225 

died a Duke and a K.G., and since his day the 
Percys have been continuously Gartered. 

But it is in the sphere of rank just below that 
of the ''Garter Families" that the Blue silk of 
Swift's imagination exercises its most potent in- 
fluence. Men who are placed by the circumstances 
of their birth far beyond the temptations of mere 
cupidity, men who are justly satisfied with their 
social position and have no special wish to be 
transmogrified into marquises or dukes, are found 
to desire the Garter with an almost passionate 
fondness. Many a curious vote in a stand-or-fall 
division, many an unexpected declaration at a 
political crisis, many a transfer of local influence 
at an important election has been dictated by 
calculations about a possible Garter. It was this 
view of the decoration which inspired Lord Mel- 
bourne when, to the suggestion that he should take 
a vacant Garter for himself, he replied, '' But why 
should I ? I don't want to bribe myself." This 
same light-hearted statesman disputes with Lord 
Palmerston the credit of having said, ''The great 

beauty of the Garter is that there's no d d 

nonsense of merit about it ; " but it was un- 
doubtedly Palmerston who declined to pay the 
customary fees to the Dean and Chapter of 
Windsor, and on being gravely told that, unless 
he paid, his banner could not be erected in St. 
George's Chapel, replied that, as he never went to 
church at Windsor or anywhere else, the omission 

would not much affect him. 

P 



226 SEEING AND HEARING 

What made the recent Chapter of the Garter 
pecuHarly exciting to such as have aesthetic as well 
as historic minds was the fact that, for once, the 
Knights might be seen in the full splendour of 
their magnificent costume. No other Order has 
so elaborate a paraphernalia, and every detail 
smacks deliciously of the antique world. The 
long, sweeping mantle of Garter-blue is worn over 
a surcoat and hood of crimson velvet. The hat is 
trimmed with ostrich feathers and heron's plumes. 
The enamelled collar swings majestically from 
shoulder to shoulder ; from it depends the image 
of St. George trampling down the dragon ; and 
round the left knee runs the Garter itself, setting 
forth the motto of the Order in letters of gold. 
It is a truly regal costume ; and those who saw 
Lord Spencer so arrayed at the Coronation of 
King Edward might have fancied that they were 
gazing on an animated Vandyke. These full 
splendours of the Order are seldom seen, but some 
modifications of them appear on stated occasions. 
The King was married in the mantle of the Garter, 
worn over a Field-Marshal's uniform ; and a 
similar practice is observed at ceremonies in St. 
George's Chapel. The Statutes of the Order bind 
every Knight, on his chivalric obedience, to wear 
the badge — the '^George," as it is technically called 
— at all times and places. In obedience to this rule 
the Marquis of Abercorn, who died in 1818, always 
went out shooting in the Blue Ribbon from which, 
in ordinary dress, the badge depends. But those 



THE GARTER 227 

were the days when people played cricket in tall 
hats and attended the House of Commons in knee- 
breeches and silk stockings. Prince Albert, whose 
conscience in ceremonial matters was even pain- 
fully acute, always wore his Blue Ribbon over his 
shirt and below his waistcoat ; and in his ancient 
photographs it can be dimly traced crossing his 
chest in the neighbourhood of his shirt studs. 
But to-day one chiefly sees it at dinners. A tradi- 
tion of the Order requires a Knight dining with a 
brother-Knight to wear it, and after dinner one 
may meet it at an evening party. The disuse of 
knee-breeches, except in Royal company, makes it 
practically impossible to display the actual Garter ; 
unless one chooses to follow the example of the 
seventh Duke of Bedford, who, being of a skinny 
habit and feeling the cold intensely, yet desiring 
to display his Garter, used to wear it buckled 
round the trouser of his left leg. Lord Beacons- 
field, in his later years, used to appear in the 
evening with a most magnificent Star of the Garter 
which had belonged to the wicked Lord Hertford, 
Thackeray's Steyne and his own Monmouth. It 
was a constellation of picked diamonds, surround- 
ing St. George's Cross in rubies. After Lord 
Beaconsfield's death it was exposed for sale in a 
jeweller's window, and eventually was broken up 
and sold piecemeal. There was an opportunity 
missed. Lord Rosebery ought to have bought it, 
and kept it by him until he was entitled to wear it. 
In picture-galleries one can trace the evolution 



228 SEEING AND HEARING 

of the Blue Ribbon through several shades and 
shapes. In pictures of the Tudor and Stuart 
periods it is a light blue ribbon, worn round the 
neck, with the George hanging, like a locket, in 
front. In Georgian pictures the ribbon is much 
darker, and is worn over the left shoulder, reaching 
down to the right thigh, where the George is 
displayed. I have heard that the alteration of 
position was due to the Duke of Monmouth, who, 
when a little boy, accidentally thrust his right arm 
through the ribbon, with a childish grace which 
fascinated his father. The change of colour was 
due to the fact that the exiled King at St. Germain's 
affected still to bestow the Order, and the English 
ribbon was made darker, so as to obviate all 
possible confusion between the reality and the 
counterfeit. Of late years, this reason having 
ceased to operate, the King has returned to the 
lighter shade. 

The last Commoner who wore the Garter was 
Sir Robert Walpole. Sir Robert Peel refused it. 
It is the only honour which, I think, Mr. Gladstone 
could have accepted without loss of dignity. For 
he truly was a Knight sans peur et sans reproche^ 
worthy to rank with those to whom, in the purer 
days of chivalry, the Cross of St. George was not 
the reward of an intrigue but the symbol of a faith. 



XXXI 

SHERIFFS 

The late Mr. Evelyn Philip Shirley, of Ettington, 
the most enthusiastic and cultured of English 
antiquaries, was once describing the procedure 
observed on the rare occasion of a '* Free Confer- 
ence" between the Houses of Parliament. ^'The 
Lords/' he said, '' sit with their hats on their heads. 
The Commons stand, uncovered, at the Bar ; and 
the carpet is spread not on the floor but on the 
table, illustrating the phrase * on the tapis,' Those 
are the things which make life really worth 
living." 

I cannot profess to equal Mr. Shirley in culture, 
but I yield to no man in enthusiasm for antiquarian 
rites. Like Burke, I ''piously believe in the mys- 
terious virtue of wax and parchment." With Mr. 
Gladstone, I say that ''the principle which gives us 
ritual in Religion gives us the ceremonial of Courts, 
the costume of judges, the uniform of regiments, 
all the language of heraldry and symbol, all the 
hierarchy of rank and title." 

My antiquarian enthusiasm for the Garter must 

not be allowed to brush aside the more obvious 

329 



230 SEEING AND HEARING 

topic of the Sheriffs. That just now^ is a topic 
which, as the French say, palpitates with actuaUty. 
November is the Sheriffs' month ; in it they bloom 
like chrysanthemums — doomed, alas ! to as brief a 
splendour. The Sheriffs of London and Middlesex 
— those glorious satellites who revolve round the 
Lord Mayor of London as the Cardinals round the 
Pope — are already installed. Their state carriages 
of dazzling hue, and their liveries stiff with gold 
bullion, have flung their radiance (as the late Mr. ]. 
R. Green would have said) over the fog and filth 
of our autumnal climate. 

" Who asketh why the Beautiful was made ? 
A wan cloud drifting o'er the waste of blue, 
The thistledown that floats along the glade, 
The lilac blooms of April — fair to view, 
And naught but fair are these ; and such I 
ween are you. 
Yes, ye are beautiful. The young street boys 
Joy in your beauty " 

But I am becoming rhapsodical, and with less 
excuse than '^C. S. C.," .whose poetic fire was 
kindled by the sight of the Beadles in the Burling- 
ton Arcade. 

On Monday the 12th of November, being the 
morrow of St. Martin, the Chancellor of the Ex- 
chequer, in clothing of wrought gold and figured 
silk, attending the ghost of what was once the 
Court of Exchequer, nominates three gentlemen 
of good estate to serve the office of High Sheriff 

1 November 1896. 



SHERIFFS 231 

for each of the counties of England. Be it re- 
marked in passing that the robe of black and 
gold which the Chancellor wears on this occasion 
is that which Mr. Gladstone's statue in the Strand 
represents, and which, as a matter of fact, he 
wore at the opening of the Law Courts in De- 
cember 1882, when, to the astonishment of the 
unlearned, he walked in procession among the 
Judges. 

Early in the new year — on *^ the morrow of the 
Purification " to wit — the Lord President of the 
Council submits the names of the nominated 
Sheriffs, duly engrossed on parchment, to the 
King, who then, with a silver bodkin, '' pricks " the 
name of the gentleman who in each county seems 
the fittest of the three for the august and perilous 
office of High Sheriff. 

I love to handle great things greatly ; so I have 
refreshed my memory with the constitutional lore 
of this high theme. The etymology of ''Sheriff" 
I find to be (on the indisputable authority of Dr. 
Dryasdust) •' Scirgerefa— the 'Reeve' or Fiscal 
Officer of a Shire.'' In the Saxon twilight of our 
national history this Reeve, not yet developed into 
Sheriff, ranked next in his county to the Bishop 
and the Ealdorman, or Earl. In those days of 
rudimentary self-government, the Reeve was elected 
by popular vote, but Edward II., who seems to 
have been a bureaucrat before his time, abolished 
the form of election except as regards the cities, 
and from his time onwards the High Sheriff of a 



232 SEEING AND HEARING 

county has been a nominated officer. Until the 
days of the Tudors, the High Sheriff wielded great 
and miscellaneous powers. He was the military 
head of the county. He commanded the ^^ Posse 
Comitatus," in which at his bidding every male 
over fifteen was forced to serve ; and he was, in 
all matters of civil and criminal jurisdiction, the 
executant and minister of the law. 

Quomodo ceciderunt fortes ! Henry VIII. at one 
fell swoop terminated the Sheriff's military power 
and made the new-fangled Lord-Lieutenant com- 
mander of the local forces ; and successive Acts 
of Parliament have, by increasing the powers of 
courts and magistracies, reduced the civil power of 
the Sheriff to a dismal shadow of its former great- 
ness. Still, in the person of his unromantic repre- 
sentative, the *^ Bound Bailiff," he watches the 
execution of civil process in the case of those who, 
to use a picturesque phrase, have ** outrun the 
constable " ; still, with all the pantomimic pomp 
of coach and footmen, trumpeters and javelin-men, 
he conducts the Judges of Assize to and from the 
court ; and still he must be present in court when 
the capital sentence is pronounced. I believe I am 
right in stating that there is no such document as a 
^' Death-warrant " known to English jurisprudence. 
The only warrant for the execution of a felon is 
the verbal sentence of the Judge pronounced in 
open court ; and, as the High Sheriff is respon- 
sible for the due execution of that sentence, he 
must be present when it is pronounced, in order 



SHERIFFS 233 

that he may know, by the evidence of his own 
eyes, that the person brought out for execution is 
the person on whom the sentence was pronounced. 
It is probable that many of my readers recollect 
the first Lord Tollemache, a man who combined 
singular gifts of physical strength with a delicate 
humanitarianism. He had been High Sheriff of 
Cheshire in very early life, and, till he was elevated 
to the Peerage, it was possible that his turn might 
come round again. Contemplating this contin- 
gency, he said that if he were again charged with 
the execution of a capital sentence, he should, 
on his own authority, offer the condemned man 
a dose of chloroform, so that, if he chose, he 
might go unconscious to his doom. 

The duties connected with the capital sentence 
are, of course, infinitely the most trying of those 
which befall a High Sheriff ; but even in other 
respects his lot is not an unmixed pleasure. If 
he is a poor man, the expense of conducting the 
Assizes with proper dignity is considerable. A 
sensitive man does not like to hear invidious 
comparisons between his carriages, horses, and 
liveries, and those of his predecessor in office. 
He winces under the imputation of an unworthy 
economy ; and, if his equipage was conspicuously 
unequal to the occasion, the Judges have been 
known to express their displeasure by sarcasms, 
protests, and even fines. The fining power of a 
Judge on circuit is a mysterious prerogative. I 
have no notion whether it is restrained by statu- 



234 SEEING AND HEARING 

tory limitations, by what process the fine is en- 
forced, or into whose pocket it finds its way. 
Some years ago the High Sheriff of Surrey pub- 
lished a placard at the Guildford Assizes setting 
forth that the public were excluded from the 
court by the judge's order and in defiance of 
law, and warning his subordinate officers against 
giving effect to the order for exclusion. The 
Judge pronounced the placard ^*a painfully con- 
tumacious contempt of the Court," and fined the 
High Sheriff £soo. My memory does not re- 
call, and the records do not state, whether the 
mulcted officer paid up or climbed down. 

If the High Sheriff has a friend or kinsman 
in Holy Orders, the Assizes afford an excellent 
opportunity of bringing him to public notice in 
the capacity of Sheriff's Chaplain ; for the Chap- 
lain preaches before the Judges at the opening 
of the Assize, and, if he is ambitious of fame, 
he can generally contrive to make something 
of the occasion. But few Chaplains, I should 
think, have emulated the courage of Sydney Smith, 
who at the York Assizes in 1824 rebuked the 
besetting sins of Bench and Bar in two remark- 
ably vigorous sermons on these suggestive themes 
— ^'The Judge that smites contrary to the Law" 
and ''The Lawyer that tempted Christ." 

Broadly, I suppose it may be said that the 
people who really enjoy being High Sheriffs are 
not those who, by virtue of long hereditary con- 
nexion with the soil, are to the manner born ; 



SHERIFFS 235 

but rather those who by commercial industry 
have accumulated capital, and have invested it 
in land with a view to founding a family. To 
such, the hospitalities paid and the deference 
received, the quaint splendour of the Assize, and 
the undisputed precedence over the gentlemen 
of the County, are joys not lightly to be esteemed. 
When Lothair was arranging the splendid cere- 
monial for his famous Coming of Age, he said 
to the Duchess, "There is no doubt that, in the 
County, the High Sheriff takes precedence of 
every one, even of the Lord- Lieutenant ; but how 
about his wife ? I believe there is some tremen- 
dous question about the lady's precedence. We 
ought to have written to the Heralds' College." 
The Duchess graciously gave Mrs. High Sheriff 
the benefit of the doubt, and the ceremonies 
went forward without a hitch. On the night of 
the great banquet Lothair looked round, and 
then, *'in an audible voice, and with a stateHness 
becoming such an incident, called upon the High 
Sheriff to lead the Duchess to the table. Although 
that eminent man had been thinking of nothing 
else for days, and during the last half-hour had 
felt as a man feels, and can only feel, who knows 
that some public function is momentarily about 
to fall to his perilous discharge, he was taken 
quite aback, changed colour, and lost his head. 
But Lothair's band, who were waiting at the door 
of the apartment to precede the procession to 
the hall, striking up at this moment ''The Roast 



236 SEEING AND HEARING 

Beef of Old England," reanimated his heart, and, 
following Lothair and preceding all the other 
guests down the gallery and through many cham- 
bers, he experienced the proudest moment in a 
life of struggle, ingenuity, vicissitude, and success." 



XXXII 

PUBLISHERS 

There is a passage in Selden's '' Table-Talk " 

which, if I recollect it aright, may be paraphrased 

in some such form as this : The Lion, reeking of 

slaughter, met his neighbour the Sheep, and, after 

exchanging the time of day with her, asked her if 

his breath smelt of blood. She replied '^ Yes," 

whereupon he snapped off her head for a fool. 

Immediately afterwards he met the Jackal, to 

whom he addressed the same question. The 

Jackal answered '* No," and the Lion tore him in 

pieces for a flatterer. Last of all he met the Fox, 

and asked the question a third time. The Fox 

replied that he had a cold in his head, and could 

smell nothing. Moral: "Wise men say Uttle in 

dangerous times." The bearing of this aphorism 

on my present subject is sufficiently obvious ; the 

^' times " — not Times — are '' dangerous " alike 

for authors and publishers, and " wise men " will 

"say little" about current controversies, lest they 

should have their heads snapped off by Mr. Lucas 

and Mr. Graves, or be torn in pieces by Mr. 

Moberley Bell. 

Thus warned, I turn my thoughts to Publishers 

237 



238 SEEING AND HEARING 

as they have existed in the past, and more parti- 
cularly to their relations with the authors whose 
works they have given to the world. How happy 
those relations may be, when maintained with tact 
and temper on both sides, is well illustrated by 
an anecdote of that indefatigable penwoman, " the 
gorgeous Lady Blessington." Thinking herself 
injured by some delay on the part of her pub- 
lishers, Messrs. Sanders & Otley, she sent her 
son-in-law, the irrepressible Count D'Orsay, to 
remonstrate. The Count was received by a digni- 
fied gentleman in a stiff white cravat, whom he 
proceeded to assail with the most vigorous invec- 
tive, until the cravated gentleman could stand it 
no longer and roundly declared that he would 
sacrifice Lady Blessington's patronage sooner than 
subject himself to personal insult. " Personal ? " 
exclaimed the lively Count. *' There's nothing per- 
sonal in my remarks. If you're Sanders, then 

d Otley ; if you're Otley, then d Sanders." 

It is to be feared that a similar imprecation has 
often formed itself in the heart, though it may not 
have issued from the lips, of a baulked and dis- 
illusioned author. Though notoriously the most 
long-suffering of a patient race, the present writer 
has before now felt inclined to borrow the vigorous 
invective of Count D'Orsay. Some six months 
before American copyright was, after long negotia- 
tion, secured for English authors, Messrs. Popgood 
and GrooUy (I borrow the names from Sir Frank 
Burnand) arranged with me for the publication of 



PUBLISHERS 239 

a modest work. It was quite ready for publication, 
but the experienced publishers pointed out the desir- 
ability of keeping it back till the new law of copy- 
right came into force, for there was a rich harvest 
to be reaped in America ; and all the American 
profits, after, say, five thousand copies were sold, 
were to be mine alone. A year later I received 
a cheque, i8s. 6d., which, I imagine, bore the same 
relation to the American profits as Mrs. Crupp's 
" one cold kidney on a cheese-plate " bore to the 
remains of David Copperfield's feast. On enquiry 
I was soothingly informed by Popgood and Groolly 
that the exact number of copies sold in America 
was 5005, and that the cheque represented (as per 
agreement) the royalty on the copies sold, over and 
above the first five thousand. That the publishers 
should have so accurately estimated the American 
sale seemed to me a remarkable instance of com- 
mercial foresight. 

Not much more amiable are the feelings of the 
author towards the publisher who declines his 
wares ; and I have always felt that Washington 
Irving must have had a keen and legitimate satis- 
faction in prefixing to his immensely popular 
'^Sketch-Book" the flummery in which old John 
Murray wrapped up his refusal of the manuscript : — 

'' I entreat you to believe that I feel truly obliged 
by your kind intentions towards me, and that I 
entertain the most unfeigned respect for your most 
tasteful talents. If it would not suit me to engage 
in the publication of your present work, it is only 



240 SEEING AND HEARING 

because I do not see that scope in the nature of it 
which would enable me to make those satisfactory 
accounts between us which I really feel no satisfac- 
tion in engaging." 

Now, surely, as Justice Shallow says, good phrases 
are, and ever were, very commendable. While 
Murray dealt in good phrases, his rival Longman 
expressed himself through the more tangible 
medium of good cheques. He was the London 
publisher, and apparently the financier, of the 
Edinburgh Review, and, according to Sydney 
Smith's testimony, his fiscal system was simplicity 
itself. *' I used to send in a bill in these words, 
^ Messrs. Longman & Co. to the Rev. Sydney 
Smith. To a very wise and witty article on such 
a subject ; so many sheets, at forty-five guineas 
a sheet,' and the money always came." Here is 
another passage from the financial dealings of the 
same great house, which during the last fifty years 
has caused many a penman's mouth to water. 
On the 7th of March 1856 Macaulay wrote in 
his diary : ** Longman came, with a very pleasant 
announcement. He and his partners find that 
they are overflowing with money, and think that 
they cannot invest it better than by advancing 
to me, on the usual terms of course, part of what 
will be due to me in December. We agreed that 
they shall pay twenty thousand pounds into 
Williams's Bank next week. What a sum to 
be gained by one edition of a book ! I may 
say, gained in one day. But that was harvest- 



PUBLISHERS 241 

day. The work had been near seven years in 
hand." 

After that glorious instance, all tales of profit 
from books seem flat and insignificant. As a rule, 
we have to reckon our makings on a far more 
modest scale. ^* Sir/' said an enthusiastic lady 
to Mr. Zangwill, '' I admire ' The Children of the 
Ghetto ' so much that I have read it eight times." 
" Madam/' replied Mr. Zangwill, " I would rather 
you had bought eight copies." Even so, with our 
exiguous profit on eight copies duly sold, our state 
is more gracious than that of more deserving men. 
Here is a touching vignette from a book of travels, 
which was popular in my youth ; *'At ^ad/e d'hote 
there is a charming old gentleman who has trans- 
lated ^schylus and Euripides into English verse ; 
he has been complimented by the greatest scholars 
of the day, and his publishers have just sent him in 
his bill for printing, and a letter to know what 
the deuce they shall do with the first thousand." 

Such are the joys of publishing at one's own 
risk. Hardly more exhilarating is the experience 
of knocking at all the doors in Paternoster Row, 
or Albemarle Street, or Waterloo Place, and im- 
ploring the stony-hearted publisher to purchase 
one's modest wares. Old John Murray's soothing 
formula about "most tasteful talents" has been re- 
produced, with suitable variations, from that time 
to this. No one experienced it oftener than the 
late Mr. Shorthouse, whose one good book — ^'John 
Inglesant " — made the rounds of the Trade, until at 

Q 



242 SEEING AND HEARING 

length Messrs. Macmillan recognized its strange 
power. In their hands, as every one knows, the 
book prospered exceedingly, and the pubhshers 
who had rejected it were consumed by remorse. 
In this connexion my friend Mr. James Payn used 
to tell a story which outweighs a great many acrid 
witticisms about ^^ Barabbas was a Publisher " and 
Napoleon's one meritorious action in hanging a 
Bookseller. Payn was '' reader " to Smith and 
Elder, and in that capacity declined the manu- 
script of '^ John Inglesant." Some years afterwards 
this fact was stated in print, together with an esti- 
mate of what his error had cost his firm. Payn, 
who was the last man to sit down patiently under a 
calumny, told the late Mr. George Smith that he 
felt bound in self-respect to contradict a story so 
derogatory to his literary judgment. ** If I were 
you/' replied Mr. Smith, " I wouldn't do that, for, 
as a matter of fact, you did reject the manuscript, 
and we have lost what Macmillans have gained. I 
never told you, because I knew it would annoy 
you ; and I only tell you now to prevent you from 
contradicting ' an ower true tale.' " Payn used to 
say that, in all the annals of business, considerate 
forbearance had never been better exemplified. 
Against this story of his failure to perceive merit 
Payn was wont to set his discovery of Mr. Anstey 
Guthrie. The manuscript of ^^Vice Versa," bearing 
the unknown name of '' F. Anstey," came in ordi- 
nary course into his hands. He glanced at the 
first page, turned over, read to the end, and then 



PUBLISHERS 243 

ran into Mr. Smith's room saying, <' We've got the 
funniest thing that has been written since Dickens's 
' Christmas Carol.' " And the pubhc gave unequi- 
vocal evidence that it concurred in the verdict. 

Let a '^smooth tale of love" close these reminis- 
cences of Publishers. Some forty years ago, when 
all young and ardent spirits had caught the sacred 
fire of Italian freedom from Garibaldi and Swin- 
burne and Mrs. Browning, a young lady, nurtured 
in the straitest of Tory homes, was inspired— it is 
hardly too strong a word— to write a book of ballads 
in which the heroes and the deeds of the Italian 
Revolution were glorified. She knew full well that, 
if she were detected, her father would have a stroke 
and her mother would lock her up in the spare 
bedroom. So, in sending her manuscript to a 
publisher, she passed herself off as a man. Her 
vigorous and vehement style, her strong grasp 
of the political situation, and her enjoyment of 
battle and bloodshed, contributed to the illusion ; 
her poems were published anonymously ; other 
volumes followed ; and for several years the pub- 
lisher addressed his contributor as '' Esquire." At 
length it chanced that both publisher and poetess 
were staying, unknown to each other, at the same 
seaside place. Her letter, written from— let us say 
—Brighton, reached him at Brighton ; so, instead 
of answering by post, he went to the hotel and 
asked for Mr. Talbot, or whatever great Tory name 
you prefer. The porter said, '' There is no Mr. 
Talbot staying here. There is a Miss Talbot, and 



244 SEEING AND HEARING 

she may be able to give you some information." 
So Miss Talbot was produced ; the secret of the 
authorship was disclosed ; and the negotiations 
took an entirely new turn, which ended in making 
the poetess the publisher's wife. 



XXXIII 

HANDWRITING 

When " The Book of Snobs " was appearing week 
by week in Punchy Thackeray derived constant 
aid from suggestive correspondents. *' ^ Why only 
attack the aristocratic Snobs ? ' says one estimable 
gentleman. ' Are not the snobbish Snobs to have 
their turn ? ' * Pitch into the University Snobs ! ' 
writes an indignant correspondent (who spells 
elegant with two Z's)." 

Similarly, if I may compare small things with 
great, I am happy in the possession of an unknown 
friend who, from time to time, supplies me with 
references to current topics which he thinks suit- 
able to my gentle methods of criticism. My friend 
(unlike Thackeray's correspondent) can spell elegant^ 
and much longer words too, with faultless accuracy, 
and is altogether, as I judge, a person of much 
culture. It is this circumstance, I suppose (for he 
has no earthly connexion with the Army), which 
makes him feel so keenly about a cutting from a 
newspaper which he has just sent us : — 

" In a report just issued by the War Office on 
the result of examinations for promotion many 

245 



246 SEEING AND HEARING 

officers are said to be handicapped by their bad 
handwriting. Some show of ^ want of intelligence, 
small power of expression, poor penmanship — in 
fact, appear to suffer from defective education.' 

''On the other hand, the work of non-commis- 
sioned officers shows intelligence and power of 
concise expression, while penmanship is good. 

'' But the percentage of failures among the officers 
shows a large decrease — from 22 per cent, in 
November 1904 to 13 per cent, in May last. The 
improvement is particularly noticeable among lieu- 
tenants. It is apparent, says the report, that a 
serious effort is being made by the commissioned 
ranks to master all the text-books and other aids to 
efficiency." 

''This," says my correspondent, "is a shameful 
disclosure. Cannot you say something about 
it in print ? " Inclining naturally to the more 
favourable view of my fellow-creatures, I pre- 
fer to reflect, not on the " poor penmanship " 
and "defective education" of my military friends, 
but on their manly efforts after self-improvement. 
There is something at once pathetic and edifying 
in the picture of these worthy men, each of whom 
has probably cost his father ;£200 a year for 
education ever since he was ten years old, making 
their " serious effort to master the text-books 
and other aids to efficiency," in the humble hope 
that their writing may some day rival that of 
the non-commissioned officers. 

It was not ever thus. These laudable, though 



HANDWRITING 247 

lowly, endeavours after Culture are of recent 
growth in the British Army. Fifty years ago, if 
we may trust contemporary evidence, the Unedu- 
cated Subaltern developed, by a natural process, 
into the Uneducated General. 

^M have always," said Thackeray in 1846, '^ad- 
mired that dispensation of rank in our country 
which sets up a budding Cornet, who is shaving 
for a beard (and who was flogged only last week 
because he could not spell), to command great 
whiskered warriors who have faced all dangers 
of climate and battle." Because he could not 
spell. The same infirmity accompanied the 
Cornet into the higher grades of his profession — 
witness Captain Rawdon Crawley's memorandum 
of his available effects : ^' My double-barril by 
Manton, say 40 guineas ; my duelling pistols in 
rosewood case (same which I shot Captain Marker) 
£20!' And, even w^hen the Cornet had blossomed 
into a General, his education was still far from 
complete : '' A man can't help being a fool, be 
he ever so old, and Sir George Tufto is a greater 
ass at sixty-eight than he was when he entered 
the army at fifteen. He never read a book in 
his life, and, with his purple, old, gouty fingers, 
still writes a schoolboy hand." 

But do Soldiers write a worse hand than other 
people ? I rather doubt it, and certain I am that 
several of my friends, highly placed in Church 
and politics and law, would do very well to apply 
themselves for a season to those ''text-books and 



248 SEEING AND HEARING 

other aids to efficiency " by which the zealous 
Subaltern seeks to complete his " defective educa- 
tion." 

Mr. Gladstone was accustomed to say that in 
public life he had known only two perfect things 
— Sir Robert Peel's voice and Lord Palmerston's 
writing. The former we can know only by tradi- 
tion ; the latter survives, for the instruction of 
mankind, in folios of voluminous despatches, all 
written in a hand at once graceful in form and 
absolutely clear to read. ^' The wayfaring men " 
of Diplomacy, though sometimes '^ools," could 
not ^^err" in the interpretation of Palmerston's 
despatches. The same excellence of caligraphy 
which Palmerston himself practised he rightly 
required from his subordinates. If a badly written 
despatch came into his hands, he would embellish 
it with scathing rebukes, and return it, through the 
Office, to the offending writer. The recipient of 
one of these admonitions thus recalls its terms, 
'^ Tell the gentleman who copied this despatch 
to write a larger, rounder hand, to join the letters 
in the words, and to use blacker ink." 

If Lord Palmerston stood easily first among 
the penmen of his time, the credit of writing the 
worst hand in England was divided among at 
least three claimants. First there was Lord 
Houghton, whose strange, tall, upright strokes, 
all exactly like each other except in so far as 
they leaned in different directions, Lord Tenny- 
son likened to "walking-sticks gone mad." Then 



HANDWRITING 249 

there was my dear friend Mr. James Payn, who 
described his own hand only too faithfully when 
he wrote about "the wandering of a centipede 
which had just escaped from the inkpot and had 
scrawled and sprawled over the paper," and whose 
closest friends always implored him to correspond 
by telegraph. And, finally, there was the " bad 
eminence " of Dean Stanley, whose lifelong indul- 
gence in hieroglyphics inflicted a permanent loss 
on literature. The Dean, as all readers of his 
biography will remember, had a marked turn for 
light and graceful versification. The albums and 
letter-caskets of his innumerable friends were full 
of these "occasional" verses, in which domestic, 
political, and ecclesiastical events were prettily 
perpetuated. After his death his sister, Mrs. 
Vaughan, tried to collect these fugitive pieces in 
a Memorial Volume, but an unforeseen difficulty 
occurred. In many cases the recipients of the 
poems were dead and gone, and no living creature 
could decipher the Dean's writing. So what might 
have been a pretty and instructive volume perished 
untimely. 

Jane Maxwell, Duchess of Gordon, the brilliant 
dame who raised the Gordon Highlanders and 
who played on the Tory side the part which the 
Duchess of Devonshire played among the Whigs, 
had, like our English Subalterns, a very imperfect 
education ; but with great adroitness she covered 
her deficiences with a cloak of seeming humour. 
" Whenever," she wrote to Sir Walter Scott, *' I 



250 SEEING AND HEARING 

come to a word which I cannot spell, I write it 
as near as I can, and put a note of exclamation 
after it ; so that, if it's wrong, my friend will think 
that I was making a joke." A respected member 
of the present Cabinet who shares Duchess Jane's 
orthographical weakness covers his retreat by 
drawing a long, involuted line after the initial 
letter of each word. Let the reader write, say, 
the word *' aluminium " on this principle ; and 
he will see how very easily imperfect spelling in 
high places may be concealed. 

With soldiers this chapter began, and with a 
soldier it shall end — the most illustrious of them 
all, Arthur, Duke of Wellington. Let it be re- 
corded for the encouragement of our modern 
Subalterns that the Duke, though he spelled much 
better than Captain Crawley, wrote quite as badly 
as Sir George Tufto ; but that circumstance did 
not — as is sometimes the case — enable him to in- 
terpret by sympathy the hieroglyphics of other 
people. Is there any one left, ^' In a Lancashire 
Garden " or elsewhere, who recalls the honoured 
name of Jane Loudon, authoress of "The Lady's 
Companion to her Flower Garden " ? Mrs. Loudon 
was an accomplished lady, who wrote not only on 
Floriculture, but on Arboriculture and Landscape 
Gardening, and illustrated what she wrote. In 
one of her works she desired to insert a sketch 
of the ^^ Waterloo Beeches" at Strathfieldsaye — 
a picturesque clump planted to commemorate our 
deliverance from the Corsican Tyrant. Accord- 



HANDWRITING 251 

ingly she wrote to the Duke of Wellington, re- 
questing leave to sketch the beeches, and signed 
herself, in her usual form, '']. Loudon." The 
Duke, who, in spite of extreme age and percep- 
tions not quite so clear as they had once been, 
insisted on conducting all his own correspond- 
ence, replied as follows : — 

^'F.M. the Duke of WeUington presents his 
compliments to the Bishop of London. The 
Bishop is quite at liberty to make a sketch of 
the breeches which the Duke wore at Waterloo, 
if they can be found. But the Duke is not 
aware that they differed in any way from the 
breeches which he generally wears." 



XXXIV 

AUTOGRAPHS 

From handwriting in general to autographs in par- 
ticular the transition is natural, almost inevitable. 
My recent reflections on the imperfect penmanship 
of the British officer sent me to my collection of 
letters, and the sight of these autographs — old 
friends long since hidden away — set me on an 
interesting enquiry. Was there any affinity be- 
tween the writing and the character ? Could one, 
in any case, have guessed who the writer was, or 
what he did, merely by scrutinizing his manu- 
script ? I make no pretension to any skill in the 
art or science of Caligraphy ; and, regarding my 
letters merely as an amateur or non-expert, I 
must confess that I arrive at a mixed and dubious 
result. Some of the autographs are characteristic 
enough ; some seem to imply qualities for which 
the writer was not famed and to suppress others 
for which he was notorious. 

Let us look carefully at the first letter which I 
produce from my hoard. The lines are level, and 
the words are clearly divided, although here and 

there an abbreviation tells that the hand which 

252 



AUTOGRAPHS 253 

wrote this letter had many letters to write ; the 
capitals, of which there are plenty, are long and 
twirling, though the intermediate letters are rather 
small, and the signature is followed by an emphatic 
dash which seems to say more explicitly than 
words that the writer is one who cannot be ignored. 
This is the autograph of Queen Victoria in those 
distant days when she said, ^^They seem to think 
that I am a schoolgirl, but I will teach them that I 
am Queen of England." 

Surrounding and succeeding Queen Victoria I 
find a cluster of minor royalties, but a study of 
their autographs does not enable me to gener- 
alize about royal writing. Some are scrawling and 
some are cramped ; some are infantine and some 
foreign. Here is a level, firm, and rapid hand, 
in which the exigencies of a copious correspond- 
ence seem to have softened the stiffness of a mili- 
tary gait. The letter is dated from "The Horse 
Guards," and the signature is 

" Yours very truly, 

George." 

But here again we cannot generalize, for nothing 
can be more dissimilar than the Duke's hurried, 
high-shouldered characters and the exquisite piece 
of penmanship which lies alongside of them. This 
is written in a leisurely and cultivated hand, 
with due spaces between words and paragraphs, 
like the writing of a scholar and man of letters ; 



254 SEEING AND HEARING 

it is dated May 29, 1888, and bears the signa- 
ture of 

^' Your affectionate Cousin, 

Albemarle/' 

the last survivor but one of Waterloo. 

But soldiers are not much in my way, and my 
military signatures are few. My collection is rich 
in politicians. Here comes, first in date though 
in nothing else, that Duke of Bedford who negoti- 
ated the Treaty of Fontainebleau and got trounced 
by Junius for his pains. It is written in 1767, just 
as the writer is ''setting out from Woburn Abbey 
to consult his Shropshire oculist" (why Shrop- 
shire ?), and has the small, cramped character 
which is common to so many conditions of 
shortened sight. (I find exactly the same in a 
letter of Lord Chancellor Hatherley, 1881.) Thirty- 
nine years pass, and William Pitt writes his last 
letter from " Putney Hill, the ist of January, 1806, 
2 P.M.," the writing as clear, as steady, and as 
beautifully formed as if the " Sun of Austerlitz " 
had never dawned. And now the Statesmen 
pass me in rapid succession and in fine disregard 
of chronological order. Lord Russell writes a 
graceful, fluent, rather feminine hand ; Charles 
Villiers's writing is of the same family ; and the 
great Lord Derby's a perfect specimen of the 
" Italian hand," delicate as if drawn with a crow- 
quill, and slanted into alluring tails and loops. 
Lord Brougham's was a vile scrawl, with half the 



AUTOGRAPHS 255 

letters tumbling backwards. John Bright's is small, 
neat, and absolutely clear ; nor is it fanciful to 
surmise that Mr. Chamberlain copied Mr. Bright, 
and were they not both short-sighted men ? And 
Lord Goschen's writing, from the same cause, is 
smaller still. The Duke of Argyll wrote a startling 
and imperious hand, worthy of a Highland chief 
whose ancestors not so long ago exercised the 
power of life and death ; Lord Iddesleigh a neat 
and orderly hand, becoming a Private Secretary 
or Permanent Official. Lord Granville's and Mr. 
Forster's writings had this in common, that they 
looked most surprisingly candid and straightfor- 
ward. The present Duke of Devonshire's writing 
suggests nothing but vanity, self-consciousness, 
and ostentation. We all can judge, even without 
being caligraphists, how far these suggestions 
conform to the facts. By far the most pleasing 
autograph of all the Statesmen is Lord Beacons- 
field's, artistically formed and highly finished — 
in his own phrase, *' that form of scripture which 
attracts." With the utmost possible loyalty to a 
lost leader, I would submit that Mr. Gladstone 
wrote an uncommonly bad hand — not bad in 
point of appearance, for it was neat and comely 
even when it was hurried ; but bad morally — a 
kind of caligraphic imposture, for it looks quite 
remarkably legible, and it is only when you 
come to close quarters with it and try to de- 
cipher an important passage that you find that 
all the letters are practically the same, and that 



256 SEEING AND HEARING 

the interpretation of a word must depend on the 
context. 

From my pile of Statesmen's autographs I extract 
yet another, and I lay it side by side with the 
autographs of a great author and a great ecclesi- 
astic. All three are very small, exquisitely neat, 
very little slanted, absolutely legible. Well as I 
knew the three writers, I doubt if I could tell which 
wrote which letter. They were Cardinal Manning, 
Mr. Froude, and Lord Rosebery. Will the experts 
in caligraphy tell me if, in this case, similarity of 
writing bodied forth similarity of gifts or qualities ? 
Another very close similarity may be observed 
between the writing of Lord Halsbury and that 
of Lord Brampton (better known as Sir Henry 
Hawkins), which, but for the fact that Lord 
Brampton uses the long '^s" and Lord Halsbury 
does not, are pretty nearly identical. 

If there is one truth which can be deduced more 
confidently than another from my collection of 
autographs, it is that there is no such thing as ''the 
literary hand." Every variety of writing which a 
''Reader's" fevered brain could conceive is illus- 
trated in my bundle of literary autographs. Seniores 
priores, Samuel Rogers was born in 1763, and 
died in 1855. A note of his, written in 1849, and 
beginning, "Pray, pray, come on Tuesday," is by 
far the most surprising piece of caligraphy in my 
collection. It is so small that, except under the 
eyes of early youth, it requires a magnifying-glass ; 
yet the symmetry of every letter is perfect, and, 



AUTOGRAPHS 257 

when sufficiently enlarged, it might stand as a 
model of beautiful and readable writing. I take 
a bound of sixty years, and find some of the 
same characteristics reproduced by my friend 
Mr. Quiller-Couch ; but between the '' Pleasures 
of Memory " and '^ Green Bays " there rolls a sea 
of literature, and it has been navigated by some 
strange crafts in the way of handwriting. I have 
spoken on another occasion of Dean Stanley, Lord 
Houghton, and James Payn ; specimens of their 
enormities surround me as I write, and I can 
adduce, I think, an equally heinous instance. 
Here is Sydney Smith, writing in 1837 to ''Dear 
John," the hero of the Reform Act, ''No body 
wishes better for you and yours than the inhabi- 
tants of Combe Florey." Perhaps so ; but they 
conveyed their benedictions through a very irritat- 
ing medium, for Sydney Smith's writing is of the 
immoral type, pleasing to the eye and superficially 
legible, but, when once you have lost the clue, a 
labyrinth. Perhaps it is due to this circumstance 
that his books abound, beyond all others, in un- 
corrected misprints. 

But there are other faults in writing besides 
ugliness and illegibility. A great man ought not 
to write a poor hand. Yet nothing can be poorer 
than Ruskin's — mean, ugly, insignificant — only 
redeemed by perfect legibility. Goldwin Smith's, 
though clear and shapely, is characterless and 
disappointing. Some great scholars, again, write 

disappointing hands. Jowett's is a spiteful-looking 

R 



258 SEEING AND HEARING 

angular, little scratch, perfectly easy to read ; West- 
cott's comely but not clear ; Lightfoot's an open, 
scrambling scrawl, something like the late Lord 
Derby's. These great men cannot excuse their 
deficiencies in penmanship by pleading that they 
have had to write a great deal in their lives. 
Others before them have had to do that, and have 
emerged from the trial without a stain on their 
caligraphy. For example — ^'Albany, December 
3, 1854," is the heading of an ideally beautiful 
sheet, every letter perfectly formed, all spaces duly 
observed, and the whole evidently maintaining its 
beauty in spite of breakneck speed. The signa- 
ture is 

*' Ever yours truly, 

T. B. Macaulay." 

Here is a letter addressed to me only last year 
by a man who was born in 18 16. In my whole 
collection there is no clearer or prettier writing. 
As a devotee of fine penmanship, I make my 
salutations to Sir Theodore Martin. 



XXXV 

MORE AUTOGRAPHS 

My suggestive friend has suddenly been multiplied 
a hundredfold. Handwriting is a subject which 
apparently makes a wide appeal. Each post brings 
me corrections or corroborations of what I wrote 
last Saturday. Fresh instances of enormity in the 
way of illegible writing are adduced from all 
quarters ; nor are there wanting acrid critics who 
suggest that reform should begin at home, and 
that " the Author of Collections and Recollec- 
tions " would do well to consult a writing-master, 
or to have his copy typed before it goes to the 
printers. Waiving these personalities; I turn again 
to my letter-case, and here let me say in passing 
that I committed a fearful indiscretion when I 
spoke of my '' Collection " of autographs. That fatal 
word brought down an avalanche of ''Collectors," 
who, hailing me as a man and a brother, propose 
all sorts of convenient exchanges. A gentleman 
who cherishes a postcard from Mr. Rudyard 
Kipling would exchange it for an unpublished 
letter of Shelley ; and a maiden-lady at Weston- 
super-Mare, whose great-aunt corresponded with 
Eliza Cook, will refuse no reasonable offer. 



26o SEEING AND HEARING 

But all these handsome propositions must be 
brushed aside, for I have no collection of autographs, 
if ^' collection " implies any art or system in the 
way in which they have been brought together, 
or any store of saleable duplicates. Mine are 
simply letters addressed to myself or to my kins- 
folk, plus just a very few which have come into 
my hands in connexion with public business ; but, 
such as they are, they are full of memories and 
morals. 

Why did very old people write so well ? I have 
already described the writing of Samuel Rogers, 
of the Waterloo Lord Albemarle, and of Sir 
Theodore Martin. Pretty well for octogenarian 
penmanship*; but I can enlarge the gallery. A 
bundle of octogenarian letters lies before me as 
I write. Oliver Wendell Holmes sends a tribute 
to Matthew Arnold. Charles Villiers accepts an 
invitation to dinner. Lord Norton invites me to 
stay at Hams. Archdeacon Denison complains 
of '' his first attack of gout at eighty-live." Mr. 
Leveson-Gower at eighty-six thanks me for a 
review of his first book. I protest that there is 
not an ungraceful line — scarcely a misshaped 
letter — in any of these five manuscripts. Here is 
a small, elegant, and *' tally" hand, rather like an 
old-fashioned lady's. The signature is 

*' Yours sincerely, 

EVERSLEY," 

better known as Mr. Shaw-Lefevre, the most authori- 



MORE AUTOGRAPHS 261 

tative Speaker the House of Commons ever had. 
Note that this was written in his eighty-eighth 
year, and he lived to buy a new pair of guns after 
he was ninety. Here is a strong, clear, well-defined 
writing, setting forth with precision and emphasis 
the reasons why the last Duke of Cleveland, then 
in his eighty-fifth year, will not give more than ;^5 
for an object which he has been asked to help. 
The writing of the beloved and honoured Duke 
of Rutland, always graceful and regular, becomes 
markedly smaller, though not the least less legible, 
till he dies at eighty-seven. There is no more 
vigorous, even dashing, signature in my store than 
" G. ]. Holyoake," written in July 1905. Close to 
the imperial purple of the Agitator's ink nestles, 
in piquant contrast, a small half-sheet of rose- 
pink paper bearing a Duchess's coronet and cypher. 
The writing is distinct and ornamental ; the letter 
was written in 1880, and the writer was born 
in 1792. But the mere fact of attaining to eighty 
or ninety years will not absolutely guarantee, 
though it seems to promote, legibility of writing. 
My venerable friend Dean Randall, who was born 
in 1824, ends a letter, which certainly needs some 
such apology, with a disarming allusion to the 
^Mreadful scrawl" of his ''ancient MS."; and 
four sides of tantalizing hieroglyphics, drawn ap- 
parently with a blunt stick, are shown by external 
evidence to be a letter from Canon Carter of 
Clewer when he had touched his ninetieth birth- 
day. 



262 SEEING AND HEARING 

On similarity, approaching to identity, between 
the writings of very dissimilar persons I have 
already remarked, and a further illustration comes 
to light as I turn over my papers. Here are two 
letters in the graceful and legible script of the early 
nineteenth century, with long S's, and capitals for 
all the substantives. Both are evidently the handi- 
work of cultivated gentlemen ; and both the writers, 
as a matter of fact, were clergymen. But there the 
resemblance stops. The one was ^* Jack" Russell, 
the well-known Sporting Parson of Exmoor ; the 
other was Andrew Jukes, the deepest and most 
influential Mystic whom the latter-day Church has 
seen. 

When I praise gracefulness in writing I mean 
natural and effortless grace, such as was displayed 
in the writing of the late Duke of Westminster. 
But, if we admire writing artificially fashioned and 
coerced into gracefulness like a clipped yew, it 
would be difficult to excel the penmanship of the 
late George Augustus Sala, who was an engraver 
before he was an author ; or that of Sir A. Conan 
Doyle, who handles a pen as dexterously as in his 
surgical days he wielded the lancet. I praised just 
now the late Duke of Westminster's writing, and 
of him one might say what Scott said, in a differ- 
ent sense, of Byron — that he '^managed his pen 
with the careless and negligent ease of a man of 
quality"; but there is another kind of grace than 
that — the grace which is partly the result of mental 
clearness and partly of a cultured eye. Here are 



MORE AUTOGRAPHS 263 

two specimens of such writing, the letters so allur- 
ingly fashioned that they look, as some one said, 
like something good to eat ; and spaced with a care 
which at once makes reading easy, and testifies to 
clear thinking in the writer. Both are the writings 
of Scholars, and both of men who wrote a vast 
deal in their lives — Bishop Creighton and Dean 
Vaughan. It must have been a joy to read their 
Proofs. The late Dean Farrar was the only Public- 
School Master I ever knew who took pains with 
his pupils' writing and encouraged them to add 
grace to legibility. His own writing, small, up- 
right, and characterful, was very pretty when he 
took time and pains ; but the specimen which lies 
before me shows sad signs of the havoc wrought 
by incessant writing against time. 

Grace and legibility are the two chief glories of 
penmanship, but other attributes are not without 
their effect. A dashing scrawl, if only it is easy 
to read, suggests a soaring superiority to conven- 
tional restraints, and rather bespeaks a hero. Here 
are two scrawls, and each is the work of a re- 
markable person. One is signed ^^ Yours truly, 
Jos. Cowen," and I dare say that some of my 
readers would see in it the index to a nature at 
once impetuous and imperious. But Mr. Cowen's 
scrawl was crowquill-work and copperplate com- 
pared with its next-door neighbour. ^'Accept the 
enclosed, dear Mr. Russell," covers the whole of 
one side of a sheet of letter-paper; the ink is 
blue; the paper is ribbed; the signature, all 



264 SEEING AND HEARING 

wreathed in gigantic flourishes and curHng tails, 
is " Laura Thistlethwaite," and the enclosed is 
one of the Evangelistic Addresses of that gifted 
preacher who once was Laura Bell. Odd incon- 
gruities keep turning up. As I pass from the 
Evangelical lady-orator, I come to Father Ignatius, 
an Evangelical orator with a difference, but with 
a like tendency to scrawl. Lord Leighton's writing 
is also a scrawl, and, it must be confessed, an 
egotistical scrawl, and a very bad scrawl to read. 
An illegible scrawl, too, is the writing of Richard 
Holt Hutton, but his is not a vainglorious or com- 
manding scrawl, but rather humble and untidy. 
^^ Henry Irving" is a signature quite culpably 
illegible, but ''Squire Bancroft" is just irregular 
enough to be interesting though not unreadable. 

Per contra, I turn to one of the most legible 
signatures in my possession. The writing is ugly 
and the letters are ill-formed, looking rather like 
the work of a hand which has only lately learned 
to write and finds the act a difficulty. But it is 
as clear as print, and it shows no adventitious 
ornamentation or self-assertive twirls. The sig- 
nature is 

''Yours most sincerely, 

Randolph S. Churchill." 

In this case, if in no other, the oracles of Caligraphy 
are set at naught. Here is a fine, twisty, twirling 
hand, all tails and loops, but not at all unsightly. 
The signature reads like " Lincoln," and only a 



MORE AUTOGRAPHS 265 

careful study would detect that the '* L" of '^Lin- 
coln " is preceded by a circular flourish which looks 
like part of the L but is really a capital C. It is 
the signature of that great scholar, Christopher 
Wordsworth, Bishop of Lincoln ; and I remember 
that, in days of ecclesiastical strife, it was once 
imputed to that apostolic man for vanity that he 
signed his name ^' Lincoln " like a Temporal Peer. 
From that day he defined the '^ C " more care- 
fully. 

To the last letter which I bring to light to-day 
a different kind of interest attaches. It is dated 

'^ Dingle Bank, Liverpool, 
April 13, 1888." 

The writing is small and clear, with the upstrokes 
and downstrokes rather long in comparison with 
the level letters ; but some small blurs and blots 
show that the letter was written in unusual haste. 
It ends with these words : " Smalley has written a 
letter full of shriekings and cursings about my inno- 
cent article ; the Americans will get their notion 
of it from that, and I shall never be able to enter 
America again. 

*' Ever yours, 

M. A." 
This was the last letter which Matthew Arnold 
ever wrote, and it closed a friendship which had 
been one of the joys and glories of my life. 



XXXVI 

CHRISTMAS 

^' Christmas, now/' as Mr. Brooke in ^^ Middle- 
march " might have said — '^ I went a good deal 
into that kind of thing at one time ; but I found 
it would carry me too far — over the hedge, in 
fact." That, I imagine, pretty well represents 
the attitude of the adult world towards the feast 
which closes the year. We all loved it when we 
were young. Now, it is all very well for once in 
a way ; it might pall if frequently repeated ; even 
recurring only annually, it must be observed tem- 
perately and enjoyed moderately. Anything re- 
sembling excess would carry one too far — ^'over 
the hedge, in fact." But, within these recognized 
and salutary limits, Christmas is an institution 
which I would not willingly let die. In the days 
of my youth a Jewish lady caused me not a little 
consternation by remarking that it seemed very 
odd for Christians to celebrate the Feast of Redemp- 
tion with gluttony and drunkenness. She lived, 
I am bound to say, in a very unregenerate village 
in a remarkably savage part of the country, and 
as, of course, she did not go to church, I dare say 

that Gluttony and Drunkenness were the forms of 

266 



CHRISTMAS 267 

Christmas observance which most obtruded them- 
selves on her notice. Even Cardinal Newman 
seems to have remarked the same phenomenon in 
his youth, though he satirized it more delicately. 
<' Beneficed clergymen used to go to rest as usual 
on Christmas-eve, and leave to ringers, or some- 
times to caroUers, the observance which was paid, 
not without creature comforts, to the sacred night." 
Now all that is changed. Churches of all con- 
fessions vie with one another in the frequency 
and heartiness and picturesque equipment of 
their religious services. Even the Daily Telegraph 
preaches Christmas sermons ; and 1 very much 
question whether the populace gets more drunk 
at Christmas than at Easter. But, though we 
may have learnt to celebrate the festival with rites 
more devout and less bibulous, we have not yet 
escaped my Jewish friend's reproach of gluttony. 
The Christmas Dinner of the British Home is 
still a thing imagination boggles at. The dreadful 
pleasantries of the aged— their sorry gibes about 
the doctor and the draught ; hoary chestnuts about 
Uttle boys who stood up to eat more— remain 
among the most terrible memories of the Christmas 
dinner. And they were quite in keeping with the 
dinner itself. I say nothing against the Turkey, 
which (as my medical friends well know) was 
found, by practical experiment in the case of 
Alexis St. Martin, to be the most easily digested 
of all animal foods, except venison ; but surely, as a 
nation, we eat quite beef enough in the course of 



268 SEEING AND HEARING 

the year without making Christmas an annual orgy 
of carnivorous excess. I protest that the very 
sight of the butchers' shops at this season of the 
year is enough to upset a dehcately balanced 
organization. Rightly said the Shah, in that 
immortal Diary which he kept during his visit to 
England in 1873 — *' Meat is good, but it should 
not be hung up in windows." Macaulay used to 
say that Thackeray, in his famous description of 
the Clapham sect in ^^ The Newcomes," made 
one blunder — he represented them as Dissenters, 
whereas, in fact, they were rather dogged Church- 
people. The only exception to the rule was a 
Baptist lady, who, living on Clapham Common, 
testified against the superstitions of the Established 
Church by eating roast veal and apple-pie on 
Christmas-day instead of more orthodox dainties. 
Churchman though I am, I protest that I think 
the Baptist lady was right : and I believe that the 
Puritans were wiser than they knew when they 
denounced Plum-Pudding and Mince Pies as in- 
ventions of the Evil One. Yet the love of these 
vindictive viands is one of the root-instincts of our 
English nature. Forty-eight years ago the British 
Army was keeping its Christmas in the Crimea, 
amid all the horrors and hardships of a pecuHarly 
grim campaign. An English Sister of Mercy, who 
was nursing under Miss Nightingale in the Hospital 
at Scutari, thus described the melancholy festivity : 
*'The 'Roast Beef of Old England' was out of 
the question, but with the aid of a good deal of 



CHRISTMAS 269 

imagination, it seemed possible at least to secure 
the Plum Pudding. I think I might with safety 
affirm that as the doctor left the ward every man 
drew from under his pillow a small portion of 
flour and fat, with an egg and some plums, and 
began to concoct a Christmas pudding. I assisted 
many to make the pudding, whom nothing short 
of a miracle would enable to eat it ; still they must 
have the thing. For some days previously I had 
been asked for pieces of linen, which, without 
dreaming of the use to which they were to be 
applied, I supplied. Thus were the pudding cloths 
provided." 

It can scarcely be conceived that these unhappy 
soldiers, maddened by wounds and fever or perish- 
ing by frost-bite and gangrene, can have had much 
physical enjoyment in Christmas puddings made 
of materials which had been concealed under their 
sick pillows ; in such circumstances the value of the 
pudding is spiritual and symbolic. A few Christ- 
mases ago I was assisting (in the literal sense) at a 
dinner for starving '' Dockers." A more broken, 
jaded, and dejected crew it would be difficult to 
picture. They had scarcely enough energy to eat 
and drink, but lumbered slowly through their meal 
of meat-pies and coffee without a smile and almost 
without a word. All at once an unrehearsed feature 
was introduced into the rather cheerless programme, 
and a huge Plum Pudding, wreathed with holly 
and flaming blue with burnt brandy, was borne 
into the hall. A deep gasp of joy burst from the 



270 SEEING AND HEARING 

assembled guests, and the whole company rose 
as one man and greeted the joyous vision 
with ^'Auld Lang Syne." The eating was yet to 
come, so the exhilaration was purely moral. 
The Pudding spoke at once to Memory and to 
Hope. 

There are other adjuncts of Christmas which 
must by no means be overlooked — Christmas 
presents, for instance, and Christmas amusements. 
As to Christmas presents, I regard them as definite 
means of grace. For weeks — sometimes months — 
before Christmas returns we concentrate our 
thought on our friends instead of ourselves. We 
reflect on people's likes and dislikes, habits, tastes, 
and occupations. We tax our ingenuity to find gifts 
suitable for the recipients, and buy objects which 
we think frankly hideous in the hope of gratifying 
our unsophisticated friends. Happily the age of 
ormolu and malachite has passed. We no longer 
buy blotting-books made unusable by little knobs 
of enamel on the cover ; nor gilt-paper weights 
which cost a hundred times more than the over- 
weighted letters of a lifetime could amount to. 
Christmas gifts of this type belong to an unre- 
turning past, and, as Walter Pater said of the 
wedding-present which he was expected to admire, 
*' Very rich, very handsome, very expensive, I'm 
sure — but they mustn't make any more of them." 
Nor will they. The standard of popular taste in 
the matter of nick-nacks has improved as con- 
spicuously as in that of furniture ; and the fancy 



CHRISTMAS 271 

shops, when spread for the Christmas market, 
display a really large choice of presents which 
one can buy without sacrificing self-respect, and 
give without the appearance of insult. 

But Christmas presents, even at a moderate 
rate of charge, may, if one has a large circle of 
acquaintance, carry one over the hedge, as Mr. 
Brooke said ; and here is the scope and function 
of the Christmas Card. Few people have bought 
more Christmas cards in a lifetime than the 
present writer ; and, out of a vast experience, he 
would offer one word of friendly counsel to the 
card-sender. Do not accumulate the cards which 
you receive this Christmas and distribute them 
among your friends next Christmas, for, if you 
do, as sure as fate you will one day return a 
card to the sender ; and old friendships and 
profitable connexions have been severed by such 
miscarriages. 

Of Christmas amusements I can say little. My 
notion of them is chiefly derived from ^^ Happy 
Thoughts," where Byng suggests some '' Christ- 
massy sort of thing" to amuse his guests, and 
fails to gratify even his Half-Aunt. My infancy 
was spent in the country, remote from Dances 
and Theatres, Pantomimes and Panoramas. '^The 
Classic Walls of Old Drury " never welcomed me 
on Boxing Night. Certainly a Christmas Tree 
and a stocking full of presents appealed to that 
acquisitive instinct which is fully as strong in 
infancy as in old age ; but, though exceedingly 



272 SEEING AND HEARING 

young in my time, I never was young enough to 
be amused by a Snow-Man or dangerously excited 
by Blind Man's Buff. Looking back, like Tenny- 
son's *' many-wintered crow," on these Christ- 
mases of infancy, I have sometimes asked myself 
whether I lost much by my aloofness from the 
normal merriment of youth. Mr. Anstey Guthrie 
knows the secret heart of English boyhood more 
accurately than most of us, and when I read his 
description of a Christmas party I am inclined 
to be thankful that my lot was cast a good many 
miles beyond the cab-radius. 

^' Why couldn't you come to our party on 
Twelfth-night ? We had great larks. I wish you'd 
been there." 

^' I had to go to young Skidmore's instead," 
said a pale, spiteful-looking boy with fair hair, 
carefully parted in the middle. " It was like his 
cheek to ask me, but I thought I'd go, you know, 
just to see what it was like." 

'^What was it like?" asked one or two near 
him, languidly. 

" Oh, awfully slow ! They've a poky little 
house in Brompton somewhere, and there was 
no dancing, only boshy games and a conjuror, 
without any presents. And, oh ! I say, at supper 
there was a big cake on the table, and no one 
was allowed to cut it, because it was hired. 
They're so poor, you know. Skidmore's pater is 
only a clerk, and you should see his sisters ! " 

All my sympathies are with Skidmore, and I 



CHRISTMAS 273 

think that the fair-haired boy was an unmitigated 
beast, and cad, and snob. But there is an awful 
verisimilitude about ^^Boshy Games and a Con- 
juror/' and I bless the fate which allowed me to 
grow up in ignorance of Christmas Parties. 



XXXVII 

NEW YEAR'S DAY 

On the ist of January 1882, Matthew Arnold 
wrote to his sister : ^^ I think the beginning of a 
New Year very animating — it is so visible an 
occasion for breaking off bad habits and carrying 
into effect good resolutions." This was splendid 
in a man who had just entered his sixtieth year, 
and we all should like to share the sentiment ; 
but it is not always easy to feel ^^ animated," 
even by the most significant anniversaries. Some- 
times they only depress ; and the effect which 
they produce depends so very largely on the 
physical condition in which they find us. Sup- 
pose, for instance, that one is a fox-hunter, in 
the prime of life and the pride of health, with 
a good string of horses which have been eating 
their heads off during a prolonged frost. As 
one wakes on New Year's morning, one hears 
a delicious dripping from the roof, and one's 
servant, coming in with tea and letters, announces 
a rapid thaw. Then ^'the beginning of a New 
Year" is "animating" enough; and, while we 

wash and shave, we pledge ourselves, like Matthew 

274 



NEW YEAR'S DAY- 275 

Arnold, to ^' break off bad habits and carry into 
effect good resolutions." We remember with 
shame that we missed three capital days' hunting 
last November because we let our friends seduce 
us to their shooting-parties ; and we resolve this 
year to make up for lost time, to redeem wasted 
opportunities, and not willingly to lose a day 
between this and Christmas. Such resolutions 
are truly " animating " ; but we cannot all be 
young or healthy or fox-hunters, and then the 
anniversary takes a different colour. Perhaps 
one is cowering over one's study-fire, with "an 
air of romance struggling through the common- 
place effect of a swelled face " (like Miss Huckle- 
buckle in '' The Owlet "), or mumbling the minced 
remains of our Christmas turkey as painfully as 
Father Diggory in " Ivanhoe," who was " so 
severely afflicted by toothache that he could only 
eat on one side of his face." Not for us, in 
such circumstances, are ^' animating " visions of 
wide pastures, and negotiable fences, and too- 
fresh hunters pulling one's arms off, and the 
chime of the " dappled darlings down the roaring 
blast." Rather does our New Year's fancy lightly 
turn to thoughts of dentistry and doctoring. We 
ask ourselves whether the time has not come 
when art must replace what nature has withdrawn ; 
and, if we form a resolution, it is nothing more 
heroic than that we will henceforward wear 
goloshes in damp weather and a quilted over- 
coat in frost. 



276 SEEING AND HEARING 

But, it may be urged, Matthew Arnold was 
not a fox-hunter (at least not after his Oxford 
days), and yet he contrived to feel '^animated" 
by New Year's Day. In his case animation was 
connected with books. 

*' I am glad," he wrote, ^'to find that in the past 
year I have at least accomplished more than usual 
in the way of reading the books which at the 
beginning of the year I put down to be read. I 
always do this, and I do not expect to read all 
I put down, but sometimes I fall much too short 
of what I proposed, and this year things have 
been a good deal better. The importance of 
reading, not slight stuff to get through the time 
but the best that has been written, forces itself 
upon me more and more every year I live. It 
is living in good company, the best company, 
and people are generally quite keen enough, or 
too keen, about doing that ; yet they will not 
do it in the simplest and most innocent manner 
by reading. If I live to be eighty, I shall pro- 
bably be the only person left in England who 
reads anything but newspapers and scientific pub- 
lications." 

We have not quite come to that yet, but we are 
not far off it, and I should fear that the number 
of even educated people who occupy New Year's 
Day in laying down a course of serious study for 
the next twelve months is lamentably small. But 
Hunting and Health and Books are not the only 
topics for New Year's meditation. There is also 



NEW YEAR'S DAY 277 

Money, which not seldom obtrudes itself with a 
disagreeable urgency. We cast our eye over that 
little parchment-bound volume which only ^'For- 
tune's favoured sons, not we " can regard with any 
complacency; and we observe, not for the first 
time, that we have been spending a good deal more 
than we ought to spend, and are not far from the 
perilous edge of an overdrawn account. This is 
'* animating" indeed, but only as a sudden stab 
of neuralgia is animating ; and we immediately 
begin to consider methods of relief. But where 
are our retrenchments to begin ? That is always 
the difficulty. I remember that after the Cattle 
Plague of 1865, by which he had been a principal 
sufferer, the first Lord ToUemache was very full 
of fiscal reforms. '' I ought to get rid of half my 
servants ; but they are excellent people, and it 
would be very wrong to cause them inconvenience. 
Horses, too — I really have no right to keep a stud. 
But nothing would ever induce me to sell a horse, 
and it seems rather heartless to kill old friends. 
Then, again, about houses — I ought to leave St. 
James's Square, and take a house in Brompton. 
But the Brompton houses are so small that they 
really would not accommodate my family, and it 
would not be right to turn the boys into lodgings." 
And so on and so forth, with a magnificent list of 
contemplated reforms, which went unfulfilled till 
things had righted themselves and retrenchment 
was no longer necessary. In the same spirit, though 
on a very different scale, the inhabitants of Stuc- 



278 SEEING AND HEARING 

covia contemplate the financial future which lies 
ahead of New Year's Day. We must economize — 
that is plain enough. But how are we to begin ? 
I must have a new frock-coat very soon, and shall 
want at least three tweed suits before the autumn. 
Economy bids me desert Savile Row and try 
Aaronson in New Oxford Street. '' Budge," says the 
Fiend. ^' Budge not," replies Self- Respect. Aaron- 
son is remarkable for a fit ''that never was on sea 
or land," and, though his garments are undeniably 
cheap, they are also nasty, and are worn out before 
they are paid for. Or perhaps our conscience 
pricks us most severely in the matter of wine. 
We will buy no more Pommery and Greno at 98s. 
a dozen, but will slake our modest thirst with a 
dry Sillery at 31s. But, after all, health is the first 
consideration in life, and, unfortunately, these cheap 
wines never agree with us. The doctor holds them 
directly responsible for our last attack of eczema 
or neuritis, and says impressively, " Drink good 
wine, or none at all — bad wine is poison to you." 
Drink none at all. That is very '^ animating," but 
somehow our enfeebled will is unequal to the 
required resolve ; we hold spirit-drinking in de- 
testation ; and so, after all, we are driven back 
to our Pommery. '^ Surely," as Lamb said, ''there 
must be some other world in which our un- 
conquerable purpose" of retrenchment shall be 
realized. 

Travel, again. Many people spend too much 
in travel. Can we curtail in that direction ? For 



NEW YEAR'S DAY 279 

my own part, I am a Londoner, and am content 
with life as it is afforded by this wonderful world 
miscalled a city. But the Family has claims. Some 
of them suffer from ^* Liver," and whoso knows 
what it is to dwell with liverish patients will 
not lightly run the risk of keeping them from 
Carlsbad. Others can only breathe on high Alps, 
and others, again, require the sunshine of the 
Riviera or the warmth of the Italian Lakes. So 
all the ways of retrenchment seem barred. Clothes 
and wine and travel must cost as much as they 
cost last year, and the only way of escape seems 
to He in the steps of the Prince Consort, who, 
when Parliament reduced his income from the 
proposed fifty thousand a year to thirty, patiently 
observed that he should have to give less in 
subscriptions. 

To the Spendthrift, or even to the more modest 
practitioner who merely lives up to his income, 
the New Year, as we have seen, offers few oppor- 
tunities for resolutions of reform ; but I fancy 
that the Skinflint, and his cousin the Screw, find 
it full of suggestive possibilities. I remember a 
gentleman of "griping and penurious tendencies" 
(the phrase is Mr. Gladstone's) telling me when 
I was a schoolboy that he had resolved to spend 
nothing with his tailor in the year then dawning. 
He announced it with the air befitting a great 
self-surrender, but I thought, as I looked at his 
clothes, that he was really only continuing the 
well-established practice of a lifetime. The Screw, 



28o SEEING AND HEARING 

of course; is of no one place or age ; and here 
is an excellent citation from the Diary of a 
Screw — Mr. Thomas Turner — who flourished in 
Sussex in the eighteenth century : " This being 
New Year's Day, myself and wife at church in 
the morning. Collection. My wife gave 6d. But, 
they not asking me, I gave nothing. Oh ! may 
we increase in faith and good works, and main- 
tain the good intentions we have this day taken 
up." Those who have tried it say that hoarding 
is the purest of human pleasures ; and I dare say 
that by the end of the year good Mr. Turner's 
banking-book was a phantom of delight. 

All these reflections, and others like unto them, 
came whirling on my mind this New Year's 
Eve ; and, just as I was beginning to reduce 
them to form and figure, the shrill ting-ting of 
the church-bell pierced the silence of the night. 
Watch-Night. Those who are not the friends of 
the English Church denounce her as hidebound, 
immovable, and unreceptive. Here is the — or 
an — answer to the charge. She has borrowed, 
originally, from the Swedenborgians and more 
immediately from the Wesleyans, a religious ob- 
servance which, though unrecognized in Prayer- 
book or Kalendar, now divides with the Harvest 
Festival the honour of being the most popular 
service in the Church of England. 

^' Among the promptings of what may be 
called, in the truest sense of the term. Natural 
Religion, none surely is more instructive than 



NEW YEAR'S DAY 281 

that which leads men to observe with peculiar 
solemnity the entrance upon a new year of life. 
It is, if nothing else, the making a step in the 
dark. It is the entrance upon a new epoch in 
existence, of which the manifold ^' changes and 
chances " prevent our forecasting the issue. True, 
the line of demarcation is purely arbitrary ; yet 
there are few, even of the most thoughtless, who 
can set foot across the line which separates one 
year from another without feeling in some de- 
gree the significance of the act. It would seem 
that this passing season of thoughtfulness was 
one of those opportunities which no form of 
religion could afford to miss. And yet, for a 
long time, that which may perhaps without 
offence be termed Ecclesiasticism sternly refused 
to recognize this occasion. The line was rigidly 
drawn between the Civil New Year and the 
Church's New Year. We were told that Advent 
was the beginning of our Sacred Year, and that 
the evening before the First Sunday in Advent 
was the time for those serious thoughts and 
good resolutions which rightly accompany a New 
Year." 

Yes — so we were taught ; and there was a great 
deal to be said, ecclesiastically, for the teaching. 
Only, unfortunately, no one believed it. We 
went to bed quite unmoved on Saturday even- 
ing, December i, 1906. No era seemed to have 
closed for us, no era to have opened : there was 
nothing to remember, nothing to anticipate ; 



282 SEEING AND HEARING 

nothing to repent and nothing to resolve. It is 
otherwise to-night.^ The ^^ church-going bell " 
does not tingle in vain. Old men and maidens, 
young men and children are crowding in. I 
involve myself in an ulster and a comforter, and 
join the pilgrim-throng. 

^ December 31, 1906. 



XXXVIII 

PETS 

My suggestive friend has taken to postcards, and 
his style, never diffuse, has become as curt as 
that of Mr. Alfred Jingle. "Why not Pets?" he 
writes ; and the suggestion gives pause. 

When Mrs. Topham-Sawyer accepted the invita- 
tion to the Little Dinner atTimmins's, she concluded 
her letter to Rosa Timmins : '^ With a hundred kisses 
to your dear little pet!' She said pet^ we are told, 
'* because she did not know whether Rosa's child 
was a girl or a boy ; and Mrs. Timmins was very 
much pleased with the kind and gracious nature of 
the reply to her invitation." My mind misgave me 
that my friend might be using the word pet in the 
same sense as Mrs. Topham-Sawyer, and inviting 
me to a discussion of the Creche or the Nursery. 
As my views of childhood are formed on those of 
Herod and Solomon, I hastened to decline so un- 
suitable a task, whereupon my friend, for all reply, 
sent me the following excerpt from an evening 
paper : — 

^^ The Westminster Cat Exhibition, which will be 
held in the Royal Horticultural Society's Hall, 

Vincent Square, Westminster, on January lo and 

283 



284 SEEING AND HEARING 

II, will afford an opportunity to all who love the 
domestic cat to aid in improving its lot through the 
agency of Our Dumb Friends' League^ which it is 
desired to benefit, not only by their presence on the 
occasion, but by contributing suitable specimens to 
the ^ Gift Class/ which will form part of the show, 
and be offered for sale in aid of the League during 
the time the exhibition is open. Children will be 
invited, for the first time, to enter into the competi- 
tion with their pets for suitable prizes, and thus, it 
is hoped, increase their interest in and affection for 
domestic pets." 

Here I felt myself on more familiar ground. 
For I, too, have been young. I have trafficked in 
squirrels and guinea-pigs, have invested my all in 
an Angora rabbit, and have undergone discipline 
for bringing a dormouse into school. These are, 
indeed, among the childish things which I put away 
when I became a Fifth Form boy ; but their 
memory is sweet — sweeter, indeed, than was their 
actual presence. For the Cat, with which my friend 
seems chiefly to concern himself, I have never felt, 
or even professed, any warm regard. I leave her 
to Dick Whittington and Shakespeare, who did so 
much to popularize her ; to Gray and Matthew 
Arnold and *'C. S. C," who have drawn her more 
sinister traits. Gray remarks, with reference to '^ the 
pensive Selima " and her hopeless struggles in the 
tub of goldfish, that ^' a favourite has no friend." 
Archbishop Benson rendered the line 

" Delicias dominse cetera turba fiigit." 



PETS 285 

I join the unfriendly throng, and pass to other 
themes. 

The pet-keeping instinct, strong in infancy but 
suppressed by the iron traditions of the PubHc 
School, not seldom reasserts itself in the freedom 
of later life. "The Pets of History" would be a 
worthy theme for a Romanes Lecture at Oxford ; 
and, if the purview were expanded so as to include 
the Pets of Literature, it would be a fit subject for 
the brilliant pen of Mr. Frederic Harrison. We 
might conveniently adopt a Wordsworthian classi- 
fication, such as '^ Pets belonging to the period 
of Childhood," "Juvenile Pets," "Pets and the 
Affections," "Pets of the Fancy," and " Pets of the 
Imagination." In the last-named class a promi- 
nent place would be assigned to Heavenly Una's 
milk-white lamb and to Mary's snowy-fleeced fol- 
lower. " Pets of the Fancy " has, I must confess, 
something of a pugilistic sound, but it might fairly 
be held to include the tame eagle which Louis 
Napoleon, when resident in Carlton Gardens, used 
to practise in the basement for the part which 
it was to play in his descent on Boulogne. 
Under " Pets and the Affections " we should recall 
Chaucer's " Prioresse " — 

" Of smale houndes hadde sche, that sche fedde 
With rostud fieissh, and mylk, and vvastel bredde." 

The Pets of Tradition would begin with St. 
John's tame partridge, and would include an ac- 
count of St. Francis preaching to the birds. The 



286 SEEING AND HEARING 

Pets of History would no doubt involve some 
reference to the Bruce's spider and Sir Isaac 
Newton's Diamond and the Due D'Enghicn's 
spaniel ; and, if so belittling a title as '^ pet " may 
be applied to so majestic an animal as the horse, 
we should trace a long Hne of equine celebrities 
from Bucephalus and Sorrel to Marengo and 
Copenhagen. The Pets of Literature are, of 
course, a boundless host — chargers like White 
Surrey, and coursers like Roland ; hounds like 
Keeldar and falcons like Cheviot — to say nothing 
of Mrs. Merdle's parrot, or Miss Tox's canary, or 
Mr. Kipling's appalling monkey, who murdered his 
owner's wife. 

Wordsworth alone is responsible for a whole 
menagerie of pets — for a White Doe, for a grey- 
hound called Dart, for ^^ Prince," '' Swallow," and 
** Little Music," let alone the anonymous dog 
who was lost with his master on Helvellyn. The 
gentle Cowper had his disgusting hares and his 
murderous spaniel Beau. Byron's only friend was 
a Newfoundland dog called Boatswain. The horses 
of fiction are a splendid stud. Ruksh leads the 
procession in poetry, and Rosinante in prose. A 
true lover of Scott can enumerate twenty differ- 
ent horses, of strongly marked individuality and 
appropriate names. Whoso knows not Widderin 
and his gallop from the bushrangers has yet to 
read one of the most thrilling scenes in fiction ; 
and I think that to this imaginary stud may be 
fairly added the Arabian mare which Lord Beacons- 



PETS 287 

field thought he had ridden for thirty miles across 
country in the strongly-enclosed neighbourhood 
of Southend. 

Among the Pets of Real Life an honourable 
place belongs to Sir Walter Scott's deerhounds — 
were not their names Bran and Maida ? — and to 
Lord Shaftesbury's donkey Coster. Loved in life 
and honoured in death were Matthew Arnold's 
dachshunds Geist and Max, his retriever Rover, his 
cat Atossa, and, above all, his canary Matthias, 
commemorated in one of the most beautiful of 
elegiac poems. With Bismarck — not, one would 
have thought, a natural lover of pets — is histori- 
cally associated a Boarhound, or '' Great Dane." 
Lord Beaconsfield characteristically loved a pea- 
cock. The evening of Mr. Gladstone's days was 
cheered by the companionship of a small black 
Pomeranian. Sir Henry Hawkins was not better 
known to the criminal classes than his fox-terrier 
Jack; and all who passed Lady Burdett-Coutts's 
house saw hanging in the dining-room window a 
china cockatoo — the image or simulacrum of a 
departed bird which lived to a prodigious age and 
used to ask the most inconvenient questions. 

The greatest patroness of Pets in Real Life was 
Queen Victoria, and her books have secured for 
these favourites a permanent place. Noble, the 
collie, will be remembered as long as '* Leaves 
from the Journal of our Life in the Highlands" 
is read ; and I can myself recall the excitement 
which fluttered the highest circles when a black 



288 SEEING AND HEARING 

terrier, called, I think, Sharp, killed a rat which 
had climbed up the ivy into the window of the 
Queen's sitting-room at Windsor. 

There are certain pets, or families of pets, which 
stand on their own traditional dignity rather than 
on associations with individuals. All Cheshire 
knows the Mastiffs of Lyme, tall as donkeys and 
peaceable as sheep. The Clumber Spaniels and 
the Gordon Setters are at least as famous as the 
dukes who own them. Perhaps the most fasci- 
nating pet in the canine world is associated with 
the great victory of Blenheim ; and the Willoughby 
Pug preserves from oblivion a name which has 
been merged in the Earldom of Ancaster. 

In the days of my youth one was constantly 
hearing — and especially in the Whiggish circles 
where I was reared — two names which may easily 
puzzle posterior critics. These were '^ Bear Ellis" 
and '' Poodle Byng." They were pre-eminently 
unsentimental persons. ^^Bear" Ellis (1781-1863) 
was so called because he was Chairman of the 
Hudson's Bay Company, and ^^ Poodle" Byng 
(1784-1871) because his hair, while yet he boasted 
such an appendage, had been crisply curled. But 
the Dryasdust of the future, pondering over the 
social and poHtical records of Queen Victoria's 
earlier reign, will undoubtedly connect these pre- 
fixes with pet-keeping tendencies, and will praise 
the humane influence of an animal-loving Court 
which induced hardened men of the world to join 
the ranks of ^^Our Dumb Friends' League." 



XXXIX 

PURPLE AND FINE LINEN 

Dean versus Bishop — it is an antinomy as old as 
the history of Cathedral institutions. The Dean, 
with a good house and a thousand a year, has 
always murmured against the Bishop, with a 
better house and five times that income ; and, 
as he is generally master of his Cathedral, he 
has before now contrived to make his murmurs 
sensible as well as audible. Of late years these 
spiritual strifes (which beautifully link the post- 
Reformation to the pre-Reformation Church) have 
been voted disedifying, and, if they continue to 
exist, they operate surreptitiously and out of public 
view. But, though Deans have ceased from cla- 
mouring, they retain their right to criticize, and 
the Dean of Norwich has just been exercising that 
right with a good deal of vivacity. I cull the 
following extract from a secular newspaper : — 

Simple Life for Bishops 

" Dean Lefroy at a meeting of the General 
Diocesan Committee to make arrangements for 
the Church Congress at Great Yarmouth in 



290 SEEING AND HEARING 

October . . . commented on the inordinate ex- 
pense of founding bishoprics, and said that 
episcopacy in Canterbury Province cost ;^i42,ooo 
per annum, and in York ;^44,ooo. He believed 
that ;^2ooo a year and a residence would be 
welcome to most bishops. The upkeep of large 
palaces swallowed up the bishops' incomes. 
Preserve the palaces, but give bishops the oppor- 
tunity of living more simply. The surplus might 
go to poor and starving clergy." 

One can picture the tempered gratitude with 
which the Bishops, and the ladies of the Epis- 
copal household, and the Domestic Chaplains — 
those ''amiable young gentlemen who make 
themselves agreeable in the drawing-rooms of 
the Mitre " — must regard this obliging invitation 
to 'Mive more simply." There is a good deal 
of human nature even in apostolic bosoms, and 
a man who has enjoyed an official income of 
^5000 a year does not as a rule regard with 
enthusiasm a reduction to ;£200o. The Bishop 
in " Little Dorrit," when the guests at Mr. 
Merdle's banquet were extolling their host's 
opulence, ''tried to look as if he was rather 
poor himself" ; and his successors at the present 
day take great pains to assure the public that 
they are not overpaid. The locus classicus on 
the subject of episcopal incomes is to be found 
in the Rev. Hubert Handley's book called "The 
Fatal Opulence of Bishops," and was originally 
supplied by the artless candour of the present 



PURPLE AND FINE LINEN 291 

Bishop of London, who in the year 1893 pub- 
lished in the Oxford House Chronicle a statistical 
statement by an unnamed Bishop. This prelate 
had only a beggarly income of ^£4200, and must 
therefore be the occupant of one of those com- 
paratively cheap and humble Sees which the 
exigencies of the Church have lately called into 
being. Out of this pittance he had to pay £i<^^o 
for a removal, furniture, and repairs to the 
episcopal residence. This, to the lay mind, seems 
a good deal. Hospitality he sets down as cost- 
ing ;^20oo a year ; but somehow one feels as if 
one could give luncheon to the country clergy, 
and satisfy even the craving appetites of ordinands, 
at a less cost. ^' Stables," says the good Bishop, 
*^ are almost a necessity, and in some respects 
a saving ; " but here the haughty disregard of 
details makes criticism difficult. ^' Robes, ^100." 
This item is plain enough and absurd enough. 
The perverted ingenuity of fallen man has never 
devised a costume more hideous or less ex- 
pressive than the episcopal ^' magpie " ; and I 
am confident that Mrs. Bishop's maid could 
have stitched together the necessary amounts of 
lawn and black satin at a less cost than ;£ioo. 
But this exactly illustrates the plan on which 
these episcopal incomes are always defended by 
their apologists. We are told precisely what the 
Bishop expends on each item of charge. But 
we are not told, and are quite unable to divine, 
why each of those items should cost so much, 



292 SEEING AND HEARING 

or why some of them should ever be incurred. 
The Bishop of London (then Mr. Winnington- 
Ingram) thus summed up the statement of his 
episcopal friend in the background : *^ It amounts 
to this — a bishop's income is a trust-fund for the 
diocese which head ministers. It would make no 
difference to him personally if three-quarters of 
it were taken away, so long as three-quarters 
of his liabilities were taken away too ; and it 
is quite arguable that this would be a better 
arrangement." 

Certainly it is '^ quite arguable " ; but is it equally 
certain that the change ^' would make no difference 
to the Bishop personally " ? I doubt it. Married 
men, men with large families and plenty of 
servants, naturally prefer large houses to small, 
provided that there is an income to maintain 
them. Men who enjoy the comforts and pretti- 
nesses of life prefer an income which enables 
them to repair and furnish and beautify their 
houses to an income which involves faded wall- 
paper and battered paint. Men of hospitable 
instincts are happier in a system which enables 
them to spend ;£20oo a year on entertaining 
than they would be if they were compelled to 
think twice of the butcher's bill and thrice of the 
wine-merchant's. Men who like horses — and few 
Englishmen do not — naturally incline to regard 
*' stables as a necessity," and even as "in some 
respects" — what respects? — "a saving." If their 
income were reduced to the figure suggested by 



PURPLE AND FINE LINEN 293 

Dean Lefroy, they would find themselves under 
the bitter constraint (as Milton calls it) of doing 
without a ''necessity," and must even forgo an 
outlay which is ''in some respects a saving." 

Again, the anonymous Bishop returned his out- 
lay in subscriptions at a fraction over ;£400 a 
year. I do not presume to say whether this is 
much or little out of an income of ^£4000. At 
any rate it is a Tithe, and that is a respectable 
proportion. But, supposing that our Bishop is a 
man of generous disposition, who loves to re- 
lieve distress and feels impelled to give a lift 
to every good cause which asks his aid, he is of 
necessity a happier man while he draws ;£4000 a 
year than he would be if cut down by reforming 
Deans to ;£200o. 

I venture, then, with immense deference to 
that admirable divine who is now Bishop of 
London, to dissent emphatically from his judg- 
ment, recorded in 1895, that the diminution of epis- 
copal incomes, if accompanied by a corresponding 
diminution of episcopal charges, would "make 
no difference to the Bishop personally." I 
conceive that it would make a great deal of 
difference, and that, though spiritually salutary, 
it would be, as regards temporal concerns, one 
of those experiments which one would rather 
try on one's neighbour than on oneself. 

An ingenious clergyman who shared Dean 
Lefroy's and Mr. Handley's views on episcopal in- 
comes, and had an inconvenient love of statistics, 



294 SEEING AND HEARING 

made a study at the Probate Office of the person- 
alty left by English Bishops who died between 
1855 and 1885. The average was ;^54,ooo, and the 
total personalty something more than two millions 
sterling. ^'This was exclusive of any real estate 
they may have possessed, and exclusive of any 
sums invested in policies of life-assurance or 
otherwise settled for the benefit of their families." 
Myself no lover of statistics or of the extra- 
ordinarily ill-ventilated Will-room at Somerset 
House, I am unable to say how far the episcopal 
accumulations of the last twenty years may have 
affected the total and the average. It is only 
fair to remember that several of the Bishops 
who died between 1855 and 1885 dated from the 
happy days before the Ecclesiastical Commission 
curtailed episcopal incomes, and may have had 
ten, or fifteen, or twenty thousand a year. On 
the other hand, it is to be borne in mind that, 
since Sir William Harcourt's Budget, the habit 
of ''dodging the death-duties" has enormously 
increased, and has made it difficult to know what 
a testator, episcopal or other, really possessed. 
But it is scarcely possible to doubt that, if the 
public were permitted to examine all the episcopal 
pass-books, we should find that, in spite of the 
exactions of upholsterers and furniture-removers, 
butchers and bakers, robe-makers and horse- 
dealers, the pecuniary lot of an English Bishop 
is, to borrow a phrase of Miss Edgeworth's, 
*' vastly put-up-able with." 



PURPLE AND FINE LINEN 295 

Just after Mr. Bright had been admitted to the 
Cabinet, and when the more timid and more 
plausible members of his party hoped that he 
would begin to curb his adventurous tongue, 
he attended a banquet of the Fishmongers' Com- 
pany at which the Archbishops and Bishops 
were entertained. The Archbishop of York (Dr. 
Thomson) said in an after-dinner speech that the 
Bishops were the most liberal element in the 
House of Lords, seeing that they were the only 
peers created for life. This statement Mr. Bright, 
speaking later in the evening, characterized as 
an excess of hilarity; ^'though," he added, ^' it 
is possible that, with a Bishop's income, I might 
have been as merry as any of them, with an 
inexhaustible source of rejoicing in the generosity, 
if not in the credulity, of my countrymen." To 
this outrageous sally the assembled prelates could, 
of course, only reply by looking as dignified (and 
as poor) as they could ; and no doubt the general 
opinion of the Episcopal Bench is that they are 
an overworked and ill-remunerated set of men. 

Yet there have been Apostles, and successors 
of the Apostles, who worked quite as hard and 
were paid considerably less, and yet succeeded in 
winning and retaining the affectionate reverence 
of their own and of succeeding generations. 
Bishop Wilson of Sodor and Man lived, we are 
told, on an income which '' did not exceed ;£300 
a year." By far the most dignified ecclesiastic 
with whom I was ever brought in contact— a 



296 SEEING AND HEARING 

true ^^ Prince of the Church " if ever there was 
one — was Cardinal Mannings and his official income 
was bounded by a figure which even the reform- 
ing spirit of Dean Lefroy would reject as miser- 
ably insufBcient. *^ It is pleasant/' wrote Sydney 
Smith, ^'to loll and roll and accumulate — to be 
a purple-and-fine-linen man, and to be called by 
some of those nicknames which frail and ephe- 
meral beings are so fond of heaping upon each 
other, — but the best thing of all is to live like 
honest men, and to add something to the cause 
of liberality, justice, and truth." It is no longer 
easy for a Bishop to "loll and roll" — the bicycle 
and the motor-car are enemies to tranquil ease — 
and, if Dean Lefroy's precept and Bishop Gore's 
example are heeded, he will find it equally difficult 
to " accumulate." 



XL 

PRELACY AND PALACES 

That delicious prelate whom I have already 
quoted, but whose name and See are unkindly 
withheld from us by the Bishop of London, thus 
justified his expenditure on hospitality : ^^ Palace y 
I am told, is from Palatimrty * the open house,' and 
there is almost daily entertainment of clergy and 
laity from a distance." I will not presume to 
question the episcopal etymology ; for, whether it 
be sound or unsound, the practical result is equally 
good. We have apostolic authority for holding 
that Bishops should be given to hospitality, and it 
is satisfactory to know that the travel-worn clergy 
and laity of the anonymous diocese are not sent 
empty away. But would not the boiled beef and 
rice pudding be equally acceptable and equally 
sustaining if eaten in some apartment less majestic 
than the banqueting-hall of a Palace ? Would 
not the Ecclesiastical Commissioners be doing a 
good stroke of business for the Church if they 
sold every Episcopal Palace in England and pro- 
vided the evicted Bishops with moderate-sized and 
commodious houses ? 

These are questions which often present them- 

297 



298 SEEING AND HEARING 

selves to the lay mind, and the answer usually 
returned to them involves some very circuitous 
reasoning. The Bishops, say their henchmen, 
must have large incomes because they have to live 
in Palaces ; and they must live in Palaces — I 
hardly know why, but apparently because they 
have large incomes. Such reasoning does not 
always convince the reformer's mind, though it 
is repeated in each succeeding generation with 
apparent confidence in its validity. After all, there 
is nothing very revolutionary in the suggestion 
that Episcopal palaces should be, in the strictest 
sense of the word, confiscated. Sixty-four years 
ago Dr. Hook, who was not exactly an iconoclast, 
wrote thus to his friend Samuel Wilberforce : *' I 
really do not see how the Church can fairly ask 
the State to give it money for the purpose of giving 
a Church education, when the money is to be 
supplied by Dissenters and infidels and all classes 
of the people, who, according to the principles of 
the Constitution, have a right to control the ex- 
penditure. The State can only, if consistent, give 
an infidel education ; it cannot employ public 
money to give a Church education, because of the 
Dissenters ; nor a Protestant education, because 
of the Papists ; and have not Jews, Turks, and 
infidels as much a right as heretics to demand 
that the education should not be Christian ? " 
This strikes me as very wholesome doctrine, and, 
though enounced in 1843, necessary for these 
times. And, when he turns to ways and means, 



PRELACY AND PALACES 299 

Dr. Hook is equally explicit : '' If we are to edu- 
cate the people in Church principles, the education 
must be out of Church funds. We want not 
proud Lords, haughty Spiritual Peers, to be our 
Bishops. Offer four thousand out of their five 
thousand a year for the education of the people. 
Let Farnham Castle and Winchester House and 
Ripon Palace be sold, and we shall have funds 
to establish other Bishoprics. . . . You see I am 
almost a Radical, for I do not see why our 
Bishops should not become as poor as Ambrose 
or Augustine, that they may make the people 
really rich." It is not surprising that Samuel 
Wilberforce, who had already climbed up several 
rungs of the ladder of promotion, and as he him- 
self tells us, "had often talked" of further eleva- 
tion, met Dr. Hook's suggestions with solemn 
repudiation. "I do think that we want Spiritual 
Peers." " I see no reason why the Bishops' Palaces 
should be sold, which would not apply equally 
to the halls of our squires and the palaces of 
our princes." ''To impoverish our Bishops and 
sell their Palaces would only be the hopeless 
career of revolution." 

The real reason for selling the Episcopal Palaces 
is that, in plain terms, they are too big and too 
costly for their present uses. They afford a 
plausible excuse for paying the Bishops more 
highly than they ought to be paid ; and yet the 
Bishops turn round and say that even the com- 
fortable incomes which the Ecclesiastical Com- 



300 SEEING AND HEARING 

mission has assigned them are unequal to the 
burden of maintaining the Palaces. The late 
Bishop Thorold, who was both a wealthy and a 
liberal man, thus bemoaned his hard fate in 
having to live at Farnham Castle : ^' It will give 
some idea of what the furnishing of this house 
from top to bottom meant if I mention that the 
stairs, with the felt beneath, took just a mile 
and 100 yards of carpet, with 260 brass stair- 
rods ; and that, independently of the carpet in 
the great hall, the carpets used elsewhere ab- 
sorbed 1414 yards — a good deal over three-quarters 
of a mile. As to the entire amount of roof, 
which in an old house requires constant watch- 
ing, independently of other parts of the building, 
it is found to be, on measurement, 32,000 super- 
ficial feet, or one acre and one-fifth." What is 
true of Farnham is true, mutatis niutandisy of 
Bishopthorpe with its hundred rooms, and Auck- 
land Castle with its park, and Rose Castle with 
its woodlands, and Lambeth with its tower and 
guard-room and galleries and gardens. Even the 
smaller Palaces, such as the ''Moated Grange" 
of Wells, are not maintained for nothing. '' My 
income goes in pelargoniums," growled Bishop 
Stubbs, as he surveyed the conservatories of 
Cuddesdon. '' It takes ten chaps to keep this 
place in order," ejaculated a younger prelate as 
he skipped across his tennis-ground. 

Of course the root of the mischief is that these 
Palaces were built and enlarged in the days when 



PRELACY AND PALACES 301 

each See had its own income, and when the in- 
comes of such Sees as Durham and Winchester 
ran to twenty or thirty thousand a year. The poor 
Sees— and some were very poor— had Palaces pro- 
portioned to their incomes, and very unpalatial 
they were. "But now/' as Bertie Stanhope said 
to the Bishop of Barchester at Mrs. Proudie's 
evening party, "they've cut them all down to 
pretty nearly the same figure," and such buildings 
as suitably accommodated the princely retinues 
of Archbishop Harcourt (who kept one valet on 
purpose to dress his wigs) and Bishop Sumner 
(who never went from Farnham Castle to the 
Parish Church except in a coach-and-four) are 
"a world too wide for the shrunk shanks" of 
their present occupants. 

In the Palace of Ely there is a magnificent 
gallery, which once was the scene of a memorable 
entertainment. When Bishop Sparke secured a 
Residentiary Canonry of Ely for his eldest son, the 
event was so completely in the ordinary course of 
things that it passed without special notice. But, 
when he planted his second son in a second 
Canonry, he was, and rightly, so elated by the 
achievement that he entertained the whole county 
of Cambridge at a ball in his gallery. But in those 
days Ely was worth £11,000 a year, and we are not 
likely to see a similar festival. Until recent years 
the Archbishop of Canterbury had a suburban 
retreat from the cares of Lambeth, at Addington, 
near Croydon, where one of the ugliest mansions 



302 SEEING AND HEARING 

in Christendom stood in one of the prettiest parks. 
Archbishop Temple, who was a genuine reformer, 
determined to get rid of this second Palace and 
take a modest house near his Cathedral. When 
he asked the Ecclesiastical Commissioners to sanc- 
tion this arrangement; they demurred. ^^ Do you 
think," they asked, ^^that your successors will wish 
to live at Canterbury ? " '^ No, / don'ty' repHed 
the Archbishop, with indescribable emphasis, ^^ and 
so Fm determined they shall.'^ 

If every Bishop who is saddled with an incon- 
veniently large house were in earnest about get- 
ting rid of it, the Ecclesiastical Commission could 
soon help him out of his difficulty. Palaces of no 
architectural or historical interest could be thrown 
into the market, and follow the fate of Riseholme, 
once the abode of the Bishops of Lincoln. Those 
Palaces which are interesting or beautiful, or in 
any special sense heirlooms of the Church, could 
be converted into Diocesan Colleges, Training 
Colleges, Homes for Invalid Clergymen, or Houses 
of Rest for such as are overworked and broken 
down. By this arrangement the Church would 
be no loser, and the Bishops, according to their 
own showing, would be greatly the gainers. ;^5ooo 
a year, or even a beggarly four, will go a long 
way in a villa at Edgbaston or a red-brick house 
in Kennington Park ; and, as the Bishops will no 
longer have Palaces to maintain, they will no 
doubt gladly accept still further reductions at the 
hands of reformers like Dean Lefroy. 



PRELACY AND PALACES 303 

It would be a sad pity if these contemplated 
reductions closed the Palatium or ^'open house" 
against the hungry flock ; but, if they only check 
the more mundane proclivities of Prelacy, no 
harm will be done. One of the most spendidly 
hospitable prelates who ever adorned the Bench 
was Archbishop Thomson of York, and this is 
Bishop Wilberforce's comment on what he saw 
and heard under the Archiepiscopal roof : '^ Dinner 
at Archbishop of York's. A good many Bishops, 
both of England and Ireland, and not one word 
said which implied we were apostles." Perhaps 
it will be easier to keep that fact in remem- 
brance, when to apostolic succession is added 
the grace of apostolic poverty. 



XLI 

HORRORS 

The subject is suggested to me by the notice- 
board outside the Court Theatre. There I learn 
that ^' The Campden Wonder " has run its course. 
A ^'horror" of the highest excellence has been 
on view for four weeks ; and I, who might have 
revelled in it, have made, per viltate, the Great 
Refusal. I leave the italicized quality untranslated, 
because I am not quite sure of the English 
equivalent which would exactly suit my case. 
''Vileness" is a little crude. ^'Cowardice" is 
ignominious. " Poorness of Spirit " is an Evan- 
gelical virtue. ^' Deficiency of Enterprise " and 
*'an impaired nervous system" would, at the 
best, be paraphrases rather than translations. On 
the whole, I think the nearest approximation to 
the facts of my case- is to say that my refusal to 
profit by Mr. Masefield's Horror was due to De- 
cadence. Fuimus, There has been a period when 
such a tale as the ^^ Campden Wonder" would 
have attracted me with an irresistible fascination 
and gripped me with a grasp of iron. But I am 
not the man I was ; and I am beginning to share 

the apprehensions of the aged lady who told her 

304 



HORRORS 305 

doctor that she feared she was breaking up, for 
she could no longer relish her Murders. 

Youth, and early youth, is indeed the Golden 
Age of Horrors. To a well-constituted child 
battle and murder and sudden death appeal far 
more powerfully than any smooth tale of love. 
We snatch a fearful joy from the lurid conversa- 
tion of servants and neighbours. We gaze, with 
a kind of panic-stricken rapture, at the stain on 
the floor which marks the place where old Mr. 
Yellowboy was murdered for his money ; and 
run very fast, though with a backward gaze, past 
the tree on which young Rantipole hanged him- 
self on being cut off with a shilling by his uncle 
Mr. Wormwood Scrubbs. In some privileged 
families the children are not left to depend on 
circumjacent gossip, but are dogmatically in- 
structed in hereditary horrors. This happy lot 
was mine. My father's uncle had been murdered 
by his valet ; and from a very tender age I 
could have pointed out the house where the 
murder took place — it went cheap for a good 
many years afterwards, — and could have described 
the murderer stripping himself naked before he 
performed the horrid act, and the bath of blood 
in which the victim w^as found, and the devices 
employed to create an impression of suicide 
instead of murder. I could have repeated the 
magnificent peroration in which the murderer's 
advocate exhorted the jury to spare his client's 
life (and which, forty years later, was boldly 

u 



3o6 SEEING AND HEARING 

plagiarized by Mr. Montagu Williams in defending 
Dr. Lamson). The murderer, Benjamin Francis 
Courvoisier by name, long occupied a conspicuous 
place in Madame Tussaud's admirable collection. 
I can distinctly recall a kind of social eminence 
among my schoolfellows which was conferred by 
the fact that I had this relationship with the 
Chamber of Horrors ; and I was conscious of a 
painful descent when Courvoisier lapsed out of 
date and was boiled down into Mr. Cobden or 
Cardinal Wiseman or some other more recent 
celebrity. Then, again, all literature was full of 
Horrors ; and, though we should have been 
deprived of jam at tea if we had been caught 
reading a Murder Trial in the Daily Telegraphy we 
were encouraged to drink our fill of Shakespeare 
and Scott and Dickens and other great masters 
of the Horrible. From De Quincey we learned 
that Murder may be regarded as a Fine Art, and 
from an anonymous poet we acquired the im- 
mortal verse which narrates the latter end of Mr. 
William Weare. Shakespeare, as his French critics 
often remind us, reeks of blood and slaughter ; 
the word ^' Murder " and its derivatives occupy 
two columns of Mrs. Cowden Clarke's closely- 
printed pages. Scott's absolute mastery over his 
art is nowhere more strikingly exemplified than 
in his use of murderous mechanisms. '' The 
Heart of Midlothian " begins, continues, and ends 
with murder. *'Rob Roy" contains a murder- 
scene of lurid beauty. The murderous attack on 



HORRORS 307 

the bridegroom in '^The Bride of Lammermoor " 
is a haunting horror. Not all the Dryasdusts in 
England and Germany combined will ever dis- 
place the tradition of Amy Robsart and the con- 
cealed trap-door. Front-de-Boeuf's dying agony 
is to this hour a glimpse of hell. Greatest of 
the great in humour, Dickens fell not far behind 
the greatest when he turned his hand to Horrors. 
One sheds few tears for Mr. Tulkinghorn, and 
we consign Jonas Chuzzlewit to the gallows 
without a pang. But is there in fiction a more 
thrilling scene than the arrest of the murderer 
on the moonlit tower-stair in ^' Barnaby Rudge," 
or the grim escape of Sikes from the vengeance 
of the mob in ** Oliver Twist " ? For deliberate, 
minute, and elaborated horror commend me to 
the scene at the limekiln on the marshes where 
Pip awaits his horrible fate at the hands of the 
crazy savage Dolge Orlick. 

But it was not only the great masters of 
fiction who supplied us with our luxuries of 
horror. The picture of the young man who 
had murdered his brother, hanging on a gibbet 
in Blackgrove Wood, is painted with a grue- 
some fidelity of detail which places Mrs. Sherwood 
high among literary artists ; and the incidents 
connected with the death of Old Prue would 
entitle Mrs. Beecher Stowe to claim kinship 
with Zola. 

It is curious to reflect that Miss Braddon, 
the most cheerful and wholesome-minded of 



3o8 SEEING AND HEARING 

all living novelists, first v^on her fame by imagining 
the murderous possibilities of a well, and estab- 
lished it by that unrivalled mystification which 
confounds the murderer and the murdered in 
^' Henry Dunbar." Nor will the younger genera- 
tion of authoresses consent to be left behind 
in the race of Horrors. In old days we were 
well satisfied if we duly worked up to our 
predestined murder just before the end of the 
third volume. To-day Lady Ridley gives us, in 
the first chapter of ^'A Daughter of ]ael," one 
of the most delicate and suggestive pieces of 
murder-writing which I, a confirmed lover of the 
horrible, can call to mind. 

To a soul early saturated with literary horrors 
the experience of life is a curious translation of 
fancy into fact. Incidents which have hitherto 
appeared visionary and imaginative now take the 
character of substantial reality. We discover 
that horrors are not confined to books or to a 
picturesque past, but are going on all round 
us ; and the discovery is fraught with an uneasy 
joy. When I recall the illusions of my infancy 
and the facts which displaced them, I feel that 
I fall miserably below the ideal of childhood 
presented in the famous '* Ode on the Intimations 
of Immortality." My ^' daily travel further from 
the East " is marked by memories of dreadful 
deeds, and the ^' vision splendid " which attends 
me on my way is a vivid succession of peculiarly 
startling murders. In the dawn of consciousness 



HORRORS 309 

these visions have *^ something of celestial light" 
about them — they are spiritual, impalpable, ideal. 
At length the youth perceives them die away, 
'* and melt into the light of common day " — 
very common day indeed, the day of the Old 
Bailey and the Police News. By a curious chain 
of coincidences, I was early made acquainted 
with the history of that unfriendly Friend John 
Tawell, who murdered his sweetheart with prussic 
acid, and was the first criminal to be arrested 
by means of the electric telegraph. Heroic was 
the defence set up by Sir Fitzroy Kelly, who 
tried to prove that an inordinate love of eating 
apples, pips and all, accounted for the amount 
of prussic acid found in the victim's body. Kelly 
lived to be Lord Chief Baron of the Exchequer, 
but the professional nickname of "Apple-pip 
Kelly" stuck to him to the end. I know the 
house where Tawell lived ; I have sat under the 
apple-tree of which his victim ate ; and I have 
stood, the centre of a roaring election crowd, on 
the exact spot outside the Court-house at Aylesbury 
where he expiated his crime. 

Tawell belongs, if I may so say, to a pre-natal 
impression. But, as the 'sixties of the last century 
unroll their record, each page displays its peculiar 
Horror. In i860 Constance Kent cut her little 
brother's throat, and buried him in the back-yard. 
Many a night have I lain quaking in my bed, 
haunted by visions of sisters armed with razors, 
and hurried graves in secret spots. Not much 



310 SEEING AND HEARING 

more cheering was the nocturnal vision of Thomas 
Hopley, schoolmaster, of Eastbourne, convicted 
in i860 of flogging a half-witted pupil to death 
with a skipping-rope, and afterwards covering 
the lacerated hands with white kid gloves. I 
confess to a lasting distaste for private schools, 
founded on this reminiscence. "The Flowery 
Land " is a title so prettily fanciful, so suffused 
with the glamour of the East, that one would 
scarcely expect to connect it with piracy, murder, 
and a five-fold execution. Yet that is what it 
meant for youthful horror-mongers in 1864. In 
1865 the plan which pleased my childish thought 
was that pursued by Dr. Pritchard of Glasgow, 
who, while he was slowly poisoning his wife 
and his mother-in-law, kept a diary of their 
sufferings and recorded their deliverance from 
the burden of the flesh with pious unction. Two 
years later a young ruffian, whose crime inspired 
Mr. James Rhoades to write a passionate poem, 
cut a child into segments, and recorded in his 
journal — "Saturday, August 24, 1867: Killed a 
young girl ; it was fine and hot." 

One might linger long in these paths of dalliance, 
but space forbids ; and memory clears nine years 
at a bound. Most vivid, most fascinating, most 
human, if such an epithet be permitted in such 
a context, was the " Balham Mystery " of 1876. 
Still I can feel the cob bolting with me across 
Tooting Common ; still I lave my stiffness in a 
hot bath, and tell the butler that it will do for 



HORRORS 311 

a cold bath to-morrow ; still I plunge my carving- 
knife into the loin of lamb, and fill up the 
chinks with that spinach and those eggs ; still I 
quench my thirst with that Burgundy, of which 
no drop remained in the decanter ; and still I wake 
up in the middle of the night to find myself 
dying in torture by antimonial poisoning. 

But we have supped full on horrors. Good 
night, and pleasant dreams. 



XLII 

SOCIAL CHANGES 

I HAVE been invited to make some comments on 
recent changes in society, and I obey the call, 
though not without misgiving. *' Society " in its 
modern extension is so wide a subject that pro- 
bably no one can survey more than a limited 
portion of its area ; and, if one generalizes too 
freely from one's own experience, one is likely to 
provoke the contradictions of critics who, survey- 
ing other portions, have been impressed by differ- 
ent, and perhaps contrary, phenomena. All such 
contradictions I discount in advance. After all, 
one can only describe what one has seen, and my 
equipment for the task entrusted to me consists 
of nothing more than a habit of observation and 
a retentive memory. 

I was brought up in that ^'sacred circle of the 
Great-Grandmotherhood " of which Mr. Beresford- 
Hope made such excellent fun in ^^ Strictly Tied 
Up." As Mr. Squeers considered himself the 
^^ right shop for morals," so the Whigs considered 
themselves the right shop for manners. What 

they said and did every one ought to say and 

312 



SOCIAL CHANGES 313 

do, and from their judgment there was no appeal. 
A social education of this kind leaves traces 
which time is powerless to efface — " Vieille ecole^ 
bonne ecole^ begad!'' as Major Pendennis said. 
In twenty-five years' contact with a more enlarged 
society, one has found a perpetual interest in 
watching the departure, gradual but nearly uni- 
versal, from the social traditions of one's youth. 
The contrast between Now and Then is constantly 
reasserting itself ; and, if I note some instances of 
it just as they occur to my mind, I shall be 
doing, at any rate in part, what has been required 
of me. 

I will take the most insignificant instances first 
— instances of phrase and diction and pronuncia- 
tion. I am just old enough to remember a great- 
grandmother who said that she ^^ lay " at a place 
when she meant that she had slept there, and 
spoke of " using the potticary " when we should 
speak of sending for the doctor. Some relations 
of a later generation said " ooman " for woman, 
and, when they were much obliged, said they were 
much *' obleeged." ^^ Brarcelet " for bracelet and 
^Mi'monds " for diamonds were common pro- 
nunciations. Tuesday was "Toosday," and first 
was '' fust." Chariot was ^^ charr'ot," and Harriet 
" Harr'yet," and I have even heard ^^Jeames" for 
James. " Goold " for gold and "yaller " for yellow 
were common enough. Stirrups were always 
called *^ sturrups," and squirrels ^^ squrrels," and 
wrapped was pronounced "wropped," and tassels 



314 SEEING AND HEARING 

^^ tossels," and Gertrude ^^ Jertrude." A lilac was 
always called a ^' laylock," and a cucumber a 
^* cowcumber." The stress was laid on the second 
syllable of balcony, even as it is written in the 
^' Diverting History of John Gilpin " : — 

" At Edmonton his loving wife 
From the balcony spied 
Her tender husband, wondering much 
To see how he did ride." 

N.B. — Cowper was a Whig. 

Of course, these archaisms were already passing 
away when I began to notice them, but some of 
them survive until this hour, and only last winter, 
after an evening service in St. Paul's Cathedral, I 
was delighted to hear a lady, admiring the illu- 
minated dome, exclaim, '* How well the doom 
looks ! " 

Then, again, as regards the names of places. I 
cannot profess to have heard '^ Lunnon," but I 
have heard the headquarters of my family called 
'* 'Ooburn," and Rome *^ Roome," and Sevres 
^* Saver," and Falmouth ^' Farmouth," and Penrith 
'' Peerith," and Cirencester '' Ciciter." 

Nowadays it is as much as one can do to get a 
cabman to take one to Berwick Street or Berkeley 
Square, unless one calls them Ber-wick or Burkley. 
Gower Street and Pall Mall are pronounced as they 
are spelt ; and, if one wants a ticket for Derby, the 
booking-clerk obligingly corrects one's request to 
'' Durby." 



SOCIAL CHANGES 3^5 

And, as with pronunciation, so also with phrase 
and diction — 

" Change and decay in all around I see." 

When I was young the word " lunch," whether 
substantive or verb, was regarded with a peculiar 
horror, and ranked with *' 'bus " in the lowest depths 
of vulgarity. To '^ take " in the sense of eat or 
drink was another abomination which lay too deep 
for words. '' You take exercise or take physic ; 
nothing else," said Brummel to the lady who asked 
him to take tea. '' 1 beg your pardon, you also 
take a Uberty," was the just rejoinder. 

I well remember that, when the journals of an 
Illustrious Person were published and it appeared 
that a royal party had '' taken luncheon " on a hill, 
it was stoutly contended in Whig circles that the 
servants had taken the luncheon to the hill where 
their masters ate it ; and, when a close examination 
of the text proved this gloss to be impossible, it was 
decided that the original must have been written in 
German, and that it had been translated by some one 
who did not know the English idiom. To ^'ride," 
meaning to travel in a carriage, was, and 1 hope 
still is, regarded as the peculiar property of my 
friend Pennialinus ; ^ and 1 remember the mild sen- 
sation caused in a Whig house when a neighbour 
who had driven over to luncheon declined to wash 
her hands on the ground that she had "ridden in 
gloves." The vehicle which was invented by a 

1 A character invented by Mr. William Cory. 



3i6 SEEING AND HEARING 

Lord Chancellor and called after his name was 
scrupulously pronounced so as to rhyme with 
groom, and any one indiscreet enough to say that 
he had ridden in '^ the Row " would probably have 
been asked if he had gone round by *' the Zoo." 

^^ Cherry pie and apple pie ; all the rest are tarts," 
was an axiom carefully instilled into the young 
gastronomer ; while ^* to pass " the mustard was 
bound in the same bundle of abominations as ^' I'll 
trouble you," ^' May I assist you ? " '^ Not any, 
thank you," and '' A very small piece." 

Then, again, as to what may be called the 
Manners of Eating. A man who put his elbows 
on the table would have been considered a Yahoo, 
and he who should eat his asparagus with a knife 
and fork would have been classed with the tradi- 
tional collier who boiled his pineapple. Fish- 
knives (like oxidized silver biscuit-boxes) were 
unknown and undreamt-of horrors. To eat one's 
fish with two forks was the cachet of a certain 
circle, and the manner of manipulating the stones of 
a cherry pie was the articulus sta^itis vel cadentis. 
The little daughter of a great Whig house, whose 
eating habits had been contracted in the nursery, 
once asked her mother with wistful longing, 
" Mamma, when shall I be old enough to eat 
bread and cheese with a knife, and put the knife 
in my mouth ? " and she was promptly informed 
that not if she lived to attain the age of Methuselah 
would she be able to acquire that ^^unchartered 
freedom." On the other hand, old gentlemen 



SOCIAL CHANGES 317 

of the very highest breeding used after dinner 
to rinse their mouths in their finger-glasses, and 
thereby caused unspeakable qualms in unaccus- 
tomed guests. In that respect at any rate, if in 
no other, the most inveterate praiser of times 
past must admit that alteration has not been 
deterioration. 

Another marked change in society is the diminu- 
tion of stateliness. A really well-turned-out carriage, 
with a coachman in a wig and two powdered foot- 
men behind, is as rare an object in the Mall as a 
hansom in Bermondsey or a tandem in Bethnal 
Green. Men go to the lev^e in cabs or on motor- 
cars, and send their wives to the Palace Ball in the 
products of the Coup6 Company. The Dowager 
Duchess of Cleveland (1792-1883) once told me 
that Lord Salisbury had no carriage. On my ex- 
pressing innocent surprise, she said, '' I have been 
told that Lord Salisbury goes about London in a 
brougham ; " and her tone could not have expressed 
a more lively horror if the vehicle had been a 
coster's barrow. People of a less remote date than 
the Duchess's had become inured to barouches for 
ladies and broughams for men, but a landau was 
contemned under the derogatory nickname of a 
** demi-fortune," and the spectacle of a great man 
scaling the dizzy heights of the 'bus or plunging 
into the depths of the Twopenny Tube would have 
given rise to lively comment. 

A pillar of the Tory party, who died not twenty 
years ago, finding his newly-married wife poking 



3i8 SEEING AND HEARING 

the fire, took the poker from her hands and said 
with majestic pain, ^' My dear, will you kindly re- 
member that you are now a countess ? " A Liberal 
statesman, still living, when he went to Harrow for 
the first time, sailed up the Hill in the family coach, 
and tradition does not report that his schoolfellows 
kicked him with any special virulence. 

I have known people who in travelling would 
take the whole of a first-class carriage sooner 
than risk the intrusion of an unknown fellow- 
passenger : their descendants would as likely as 
not reach their destination on motor-cars, having 
pulled up at some wayside inn for mutton chops 
and whisky-and-soda. 



XLIII 

SOCIAL GRACES 

Though stateliness has palpably diminished, the 
beauty of life has as palpably increased. In old 
days people loved, or professed to love, fine pic- 
tures, and those who had them made much of 
them. But with that one exception no one made 
any attempt to surround himself with beautiful 
objects. People who happened to have fine furni- 
ture used it because they had it ; unless, indeed, 
the desire to keep pace with the fashion induced 
them to part with Louis Seize or Chippendale and 
replace it by the austere productions of Tottenham 
Court Road. The idea of buying a chimneypiece 
or a cabinet or a bureau because it was beautiful 
never crossed the ordinary mind. The finest old 
English china was habitually used, and not seldom 
smashed, in the housekeeper's room. It was the 
age of horse-hair and mahogany, and crimson flock 
papers and green rep curtains. Whatever orna- 
ments the house happened to possess were clustered 
together on a round table in the middle of the 
drawing-room. The style has been immortalized 
by the hand of a master: '^ There were no skil- 
fully contrasted shades of grey or green, no dado, 

319 



320 SEEING AND HEARING 

no distemper. The woodwork was grained and 
varnished after the manner of the Philistines, the 
walls papered in dark crimson, with heavy curtains 
of the same colour, and the sideboard, dinner- 
waggon, and row of stiff chairs were all carved in 
the same massive and expensive style of ugliness. 
The pictures were those familiar presentments of 
dirty rabbits, fat white horses, bloated goddesses, 
and misshapen boors by masters, who if younger 
than they assumed to be, must have been quite old 
enough to know better." A man who hung a blue- 
and-white plate on a wall, or put peacocks' feathers 
in a vase, would have been regarded as insane ; 
and I well remember the outcry of indignation and 
scorn when a well-known collector of bric-a-brac 
had himself painted with a pet teapot in his hands. 
In this respect the change is complete. The 
owners of fine picture-galleries no longer mono- 
polize ^^art in the home." People who cannot 
afford old masters invoke the genius of Mr. Mor- 
timer Menpes. If they have not inherited French 
furniture they buy it, or at least imitations of the 
real, which are quite as beautiful. A sage-green 
wash on the wall, and a white dado to the height 
of a man's shoulder, cover a multitude of paper- 
hanger's sins. The commonest china is pretty in 
form and colour. A couple of rugs from Liberty's 
replace the hideous and costly carpets which lasted 
their unfortunate possessors a lifetime ; and, where- 
as in those distant days one never saw a flower on 
a dinner-table, now *^ it is roses, roses all the way," 



SOCIAL GRACES 321 

or, when it cannot be roses, it is daffodils and 
tulips and poppies and chrysanthemums. 

All this is the work of the despised aesthetes ; but 
this generation will probably see no meaning in 
the great drama of '' Patience," and has no concep- 
tion of the tyrannous ugliness from which Bun- 
thorne and his friends delivered us. Their double 
achievement was to make ugliness culpable, and to 
prove that beauty need not be expensive. 

The same change may be observed in everything 
connected with Dinner. No longer is the mind 
oppressed by those monstrous hecatombs under 
which, as Bret Harte said, '' the table groaned and 
even the sideboard sighed." Frascatelli's mon- 
strous bills of fare, with six '' side dishes " and four 
sweets, survive only as monuments of what our 
fathers could do. Racing plate and '^epergnes," 
with silver goddesses and sphinxes and rams' horns, 
if not discreetly exchanged for prettier substitutes, 
hide their diminished heads in pantries and safes. 
Instead of these horrors, we have bright flowers 
and shaded lights ; and a very few, perhaps too few, 
dishes, which both look pretty and taste good. 
Here, again, expensive ugliness has been routed, 
and inexpensive beauty enthroned in its place. 

The same law, I beUeve, holds good about dress. 
With the mysteiies of woman's clothes I do not 
presume to meddle. I do not attempt to estimate 
the relative cost of the satins and ermine and 
scarves which Lawrence painted, and the '' duck's- 
egg bolero " and ''mauve hopsack" which I have 

X 



322 SEEING AND HEARING 

lately seen advertized in the list of a winter sale. 
But about men's dress I feel more confident. The 
^' rich cut Genoa velvet waistcoat," the solemn frock 
coat, the satin stock, and the trousers strapped 
under the Wellingtons, were certainly hideous, and 
I shrewdly suspect that they were vastly more 
expensive than the blue serge suits, straw hats, 
brown boots, and sailor-knot ties in which the men 
of the present day contrive to look smart without 
being stiff. 

When Mr. Gladstone in old age revisited Oxford 
and lectured on Homer to a great gathering of 
undergraduates, he was asked if he saw any dif- 
ference between his hearers and the men of his 
own time. He responded briskly, '^Yes, in their 
dress, an enormous difference. I am told that I had 
among my audience some of the most highly-con- 
nected and richest men in the university, and there 
wasn't one whom I couldn't have dressed from top 
to toe for £s:' 

I have spoken so far of material beauty, and here 
the change in society has been an inexpressible im- 
provement ; but, when I turn to beauty of another 
kind, I cannot speak with equal certainty. Have 
our manners improved ? Beyond all question they 
have changed, but have they changed for the 
better ? 

It may seem incongruous to cite Dr. Pusey as an 
authority on anything more mundane than a hair- 
shirt, yet he was really a close observer of social 
phenomena, as his famous sermon on Dives and 



SOCIAL GRACES 323 

Lazarus, with its strictures on the modern Dives's 
dinner and Mrs. Dives's ball-gown, sufficiently 
testifies. He was born a Bouverie in 1800, when 
the Bouveries still were Whigs, and he testified in 
old age to '*the beauty of the refined worldly 
manners of the old school," which, as he insisted, 
were really Christian in their regard for the feelings 
of others. ^^ If in any case they became soulless as 
apart from Christianity, the beautiful form was 
there into which real life might re-enter." 

We do not, I think, see much of the " beautiful 
form" nowadays. Men when talking to women 
lounge, and sprawl, and cross their legs, and keep 
one hand in a pocket while they shake hands with 
the other, and shove their partners about in the 
^^ Washington Post," and wallow in the Kitchen- 
Lancers. All this is as little beautiful as can be 
conceived. Grace and dignity have perished side 
by side. And yet, oddly enough, the people who 
are most thoroughly bereft of manners seem bent 
on displaying their deficiencies in the most con- 
spicuous places. In the old days it would have 
been thought the very height of vulgarity to run 
after royalty. The Duke of Wellington said to 
Charles Greville, '^ When we meet the Royal Family 
in society they are our superiors, and we owe them 
all respect." That was just all. If a Royal Person- 
age knew you sufficiently well to pay you a visit, it 
was an honour, and all suitable preparations were 
made. ^' My father walked backwards with a silver 
candlestick, and red baize awaited the royal feet." 



324 SEEING AND HEARING 

If you encountered a prince or princess in society, 
you made your bow and thought no more about it. 
An old-fashioned father, who had taken a schoolboy 
son to call on a great lady, said, *^Your bow was 
too low. That is the sort of bow we keep for the 
Royal Family." There was neither drop-down- 
dead-ativeness, nor pushfulness, nor familiarity. 
Well-bred people knew how to behave themselves, 
and there was an end of the matter. But to force 
one's self on the notice of royalty, to intrigue for 
visits from Illustrious Personages, to go out of one's 
way to meet princes or princesses, to parade before 
the gaping world the amount of intimacy with 
which one had been honoured, would have been 
regarded as the very madness of vulgarity. 

Another respect in which modern manners com- 
pare unfavourably with ancient is the growing love 
of titles. In old days people thought a great deal, 
perhaps too much, of Family. They had a strong 
sense of territorial position, and I have heard 
people say of others, ^^Oh, they are cousins of 
ours," as if that fact put them within a sacred and 
inviolable enclosure. But titles were contemned. 
If you were a peer, you sate in the House of Lords 
instead of the House of Commons ; and that was all. 
No one dreamed of babbling about '^peers'' as a 
separate order of creation, still less of enumerating 
the peers to whom they were related. 

A member of the Tory Government was once 
at pains to explain to an entirely unsympathetic 
audience that the only reason why he and Lord 



SOCIAL GRACES 325 

Curzon had not taken as good a degree as Mr. 
Asquith was that, being the eldest sons of peers, 
they were more freely invited into the County 
society of Oxfordshire. I can safely say that, in the 
sacred circle of the Great-Grandmotherhood, that 
theory of academical shortcoming would not have 
been advanced. 

The idea of buying a baronetcy would have been 
thought simply droll, and knighthood was regarded 
as the guerdon of the successful grocer. I believe 
that in their inmost hearts the Whigs enjoyed the 
Garters which were so freely bestowed on them ; 
but they compounded for that human weakness by 
unmeasured contempt for the Bath, and I doubt if 
they had ever heard of the Star of India. To state 
this case is sufficiently to illustrate a conspicuous 
change in the sentiment of society. 



XLIV 

PUBLICITY V, RETICENCE 

The great people of old time followed (quite un- 
consciously) the philosopher who bade man '* hide 
his life." Of course, the stage of politics was 
always a pillory, and he who ventured to stand 
on it made up his mind to encounter a vast 
variety of popular missiles. " In my situation as 
Chancellor of the University of Oxford," said the 
Duke of Wellington, *^ I have been much exposed 
to authors ; " and men whom choice or circum- 
stances forced into politics were exposed to worse 
annoyances than "authors." But the Hne was 
rigidly drawn between public and private life. 
What went on m the home was sacredly secreted 
from the public gaze. People lived among their 
relations and friends and political associates, and 
kept the gaping world at a distance. Now we wor- 
ship Publicity as the chief enjoyment of human 
life. We send lists of our shooting-parties to 
*' Society Journals." We welcome the Interviewer. 
We contribute personal paragraphs to Classy 
Cuttings. We admit the photographer to our bed- 
rooms, and give our portraits to illustrated papers. 

We take our exercise when we have the best 

326 



PUBLICITY F. RETICENCE 327 

chance of being seen and noticed, and we never 
eat our dinner with such keen appetites as amid 
the half-world of a Piccadilly restaurant. In brief, 
''Expose thy life" is the motto of the new philo- 
sophy, and I maintain that in this respect, at any 
rate, the old was better. 

With an increasing love of publicity has come 
an increasing contempt for reticence. In old 
days there were certain subjects which no one 
mentioned ; among them were Health and Money. 
I presume that people had pretty much the same 
complaints as now, but no one talked about them. 
We used to be told of a lady who died in agony 
because she insisted on telling the doctor that 
the pain was in her chest whereas it really was 
in the unmentionable organ of digestion. That 
martyr to propriety has no imitators in the pre- 
sent day. Every one has a disease and a doctor ; 
and young people of both sexes are ready on the 
slightest acquaintance to describe symptoms and 
compare experiences. '' Ice ! " exclaimed a pretty 
girl at dessert, " good gracious, no ! so bad for 
indy " — and her companion, who had not travelled 
with the times, learned with amazement that 
''indy" was the pet name for indigestion. "How 
bitterly cold ! " said a plump matron at an open- 
air luncheon; "just the thing to give one appen- 
dicitis." "Oh!" said her neighbour, surveying 
the company, "we are quite safe there. I shouldn't 
think we had an appendix between us." 

Then, again, as to money. In the "Sacred 



328 SEEING AND HEARING 

Circle of the Great-Grandmotherhood " I never 
heard the slightest reference to income. Not that 
the Whigs despised money. They were at least as 
fond of it as other people, and, even when it took 
the shape of slum-rents, its odour was not displeas- 
ing. But it was not a subject for conversation. 
People did not chatter about their neighbours' 
incomes ; and, if they made their own money in 
trades or professions, they did not regale us with 
statistics of profit and loss. To-day every one 
seems to be, if I may use the favourite collo- 
quialism, ^^ on the make " ; and the sincerity of 
the devotion with which people worship money 
pervades their whole conversation and colours 
their whole view of life. *^ Scions of aristocracy," 
to use the good old phrase of Pennialinus, will 
produce samples of tea or floor-cloth from their 
pockets, and sue quite winningly for custom. A 
speculative bottle of extraordinarily cheap peach- 
brandy will arrive with the compliments of Lord 
Tom Noddy, who has just gone into the wine 
trade, and Lord Magnus Charters will tell you that, 
if you are going to put in the electric light, his firm 
has got some really good fittings which he can let 
you have on specially easy terms. 

But, if in old days Health and Money were sub- 
jects eschewed in polite conversation, even more 
rigid was the avoidance of ^* risky " topics. To-day 
no scandal is too gross, no gossip too prurient. 
Respectable mothers chatter quite freely about 
that ^^nest of spicery" over which Sir Gorell 



PUBLICITY V. RETICENCE 329 

Barnes presides, and canvass abominations with a 
self-possession worthy of Gibbon or Zola. In fact, 
as regards our topics of conversation, we seem to 
have reached the condition in which the Paris 
correspondent of the Daily Telegraph found him- 
self when Mr. Matthew Arnold (in ^' Friendship's 
Garland") spoke to him of Delicacy. " He seemed 
inexplicably struck by this word delicacy^ which he 
kept repeating to himself. ' Delicacy,' said he ; 
' delicacy, surely I have heard that word before ! 
Yes, in other days,' he went on dreamily, * in my 
fresh enthusiastic youth, before I knew Sala, before 

I wrote for that infernal paper .' ^ Collect 

yourself, my friend,' said I, laying my hand on 
his shoulder, * you are unmanned.' " A similar 
emotion would probably be caused by any one so 
old-fashioned as to protest that any conceivable 
topic was ill-adapted for discussion in general 
society. 

An extreme decorum of phrase accompanied 
this salutary restriction of topics. To a boisterous 
youth who, just setting out for a choral festival in 
a country church, said that he always thought a 
musical service very jolly, an old Whig lady said 
in a tone of dignified amendment, " I trust, dear 

Mr. F , that we shall derive not only pleasure 

but profit from the solemnity of this afternoon." 

Closely related to the love of Publicity and the 
decay of Reticence is the change in the position 
of women. This is really a revolution, and it has 
so impartially pervaded all departments of life 



330 SEEING AND HEARING 

that one may plunge anywhere into the subject 
and find the same phenomenon. 

Fifty years ago the view that '^comparisons 
don't become a young woman " still held the field, 
and, indeed, might have been much more widely 
extended. Nothing '' became a young woman," 
which involved clear thinking or plain speaking 
or independent acting. Mrs. General and Mrs. 
Grundy were still powers in the land. *' Prunes 
and Prism " were fair burlesques of actual shib- 
boleths. '^ Fanny," said Mrs. General, '' at present 
forms too many opinions. Perfect breeding forms 
none, and is never demonstrative." This was 
hardly a parody of the prevailing and accepted 
doctrine. To-day it would be difficult to find a 
subject on which contemporary Fannies do not 
form opinions, and express them with intense 
vigour, and translate them into corresponding 
action. 

Fifty years ago a hunting woman was a rarity, 
even though Englishwomen had been horsewomen 
from time immemorial. Lady Arabella Vane's per- 
formances were still remembered in the neighbour- 
hood of Darlington, and Lady William Powlett's 
^'scyarlet" habit was a tradition at Cottesmore. 
Mrs. Jack ViUiers is the only horsewoman in the 
famous picture of the Quorn, and she suitably 
gave her name to the best covert in the Vale of 
Aylesbury. But now the hunting woman and 
the hunting girl pervade the land, cross their 
male friends at their fences, and ride over them 



PUBLICITY V. RETICENCE 331 

when they lie submerged in ditches, with an airy 
cheerfuhiess which wins all hearts. In brief, it 
may be said that, in respect of outdoor exercises, 
whatever men and boys do women and girls do. 
They drive four-in-hand and tandem, they manipu- 
late Motors, they skate and cycle, and fence and 
swim. A young lady lately showed me a snap- 
shot of herself learning to take a header. A male 
instructor, classically draped, stood on the bank, 
and she kindly explained that ^'the head in the 
water was the man we were staying with." Lawn- 
tennis and croquet are regarded as the amuse- 
ments of the mild and the middle-aged ; the 
ardour of girlhood requires hockey and golf. I 
am not sure whether girls have taken to Rugby 
football, but only last summer I saw a girl's 
cricket eleven dispose most satisfactorily of a 
boy's team. 

I can well remember the time when a man, if 
perchance he met a lady while he was smoking in 
some rather unfrequented street, flung his cigar 
away and rather tried to look as if he had not 
been doing it. Yet so far have we travelled that 
not long ago, at a hospitable house not a hundred 
miles from Berkeley Square, the hostess and her 
daughter were the only smokers in a large luncheon- 
party, and prefaced their cigarettes by the cour- 
teous condition, '^ If you gentlemen don't mind." 

Then, again, the political woman is a product 
of these latter days. In old times a woman served 
her husband's political party by keeping a sa/on, 



332 SEEING AND HEARING 

giving dinners to the bigwigs, and '' routs " to the 
rank and file. I do not forget the heroic elec- 
tioneering of Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire, 
but her example was not widely followed. On great 
occasions ladies sate in secluded galleries at public 
meetings, and encouraged the halting rhetoric of 
sons or husbands by waving pocket-handkerchiefs. 
If a triumphant return was to be celebrated, the 
ladies of the hero's family might gaze from above 
on the congratulatory banquet, like the house- 
party at Lothair's coming of age, to whom the 
^^ three times three and one cheer more" seemed 
like a ^' great naval battle, or the end of the 
world, or anything else of unimaginable excite- 
ment, tumult, and confusion." 

When it was reported that a celebrated lady of 
the present day complained of the stuffiness and 
gloom of the Ladies' Gallery in the House of 
Commons, Mr. Gladstone — that stiffest of social 

conservatives — exclaimed, '^Mrs. W , forsooth! 

I have known much greater ladies than Mrs. 

W quite content to look down through the 

ventilator." 



XLV 

TOWN V. COUNTRY 

I SAID at the outset that I am a Whig pur sang ; 
and the historic Whigs were very worthy people. A 
first-rate specimen of the race was that Duke of 
Bedford whom Junius lampooned, and whom his 
great-grandson, Lord John Russell, championed in 
an interesting contrast. ** The want of practical 
religion and morals which Lord Chesterfield held 
up to imitation, conducted the French nobility to 
the guillotine and emigration : the honesty, the 
attachment to religion, the country habits, the 
love of home, the activity in rural business and 
rural sports, in which the Duke of Bedford and 
others of his class delighted, preserved the Eng- 
lish aristocracy from a flood which swept over 
half of Europe, laying prostrate the highest of 
her palaces, and scattering the ashes of the most 
sacred of her monuments." 

This quotation forms a suitable introduction to 
the social change which is the subject of the 
present chapter. In old days, people who had 
country houses lived in them. It was the magni- 
ficent misfortune of the Duke in ^' Lothair " to have 
so many castles that he had no home. In those 

333 



334 SEEING AND HEARING 

days the tradition of Duty required people who 
had several country houses to spend some time 
in each of them ; and those who had only one 
passed nine months out of twelve under its sacred 
roof — sacred because it was inseparably connected 
with memories of ancestry and parentage and early 
association, with marriage and children, and pure 
enjoyments and active benevolence and neigh- 
bourly goodwill. In a word, the country house 
was Home. 

People who had no country house were honestly 
pitied ; perhaps they were also a little despised. 
The most gorgeous mansion in Cromwell Road 
or Tyburnia could never for a moment be quoted 
as supplying the place of the Hall or the Manor. 

For people who had a country house the in- 
terests of life were very much bound up in the 
park and the covers, the croquet-ground and 
the cricket-ground, the kennel, the stable, and 
the garden. I remember, when I was an under- 
graduate, lionizing some Yorkshire damsels on 
their first visit to Oxford, then in the '^high mid- 
summer pomp" of its beauty. But all they said 
was, in the pensive tone of an unwilling exile, 
*' How beautifully the sun must be shining on 
the South Walk at home ! " 

The village church was a great centre of 
domestic affection. All the family had been chris- 
tened in' it. The eldest sister had been married 
in it. Generations of ancestry mouldered under 
the chancel floor. Christmas decorations were an 



TOWN V, COUNTRY 335 

occasion of much innocent merriment, and a little 
ditty high in favour in Tractarian homes warned 
the decorators to be — 

" Unselfish — looking not to see 

Proofs of their own dexterity ; 

But quite contented that ' I ' should 

Forgotten be in brotherhood." 

Of course, whether Tractarian or Evangelical, 
religious people regarded church-going as a spiri- 
tual privilege ; but every one recognized it as a 
civil duty. '^ When a gentleman is sur ses terres," 
said Major Pendennis, ''he must give an example 
to the country people ; and, if I could turn a 
tune, I even think I should sing. The Duke of 
St. David's, whom I have the honour of knowing, 
always sings in the country, and let me tell you 
it has a doosed fine effect from the family pew." 
Before the passion for "restoration" had set in, 
and ere yet Sir Gilbert Scott had transmogrified 
the parish churches of England, the family pew 
was indeed the ark and sanctuary of the terri- 
torial system — and a very comfortable ark too. 
It had a private entrance, a round table, a good 
assortment of arm-chairs, a fireplace, and a wood- 
basket. And I well remember a washleather glove 
of unusual size which was kept in the wood- 
basket for the greater convenience of making up 
the fire during divine service. "You may re- 
store the church as much as you like," said an 
old friend of my youth, who was lay-rector, to an 
innovating incumbent, "but I must insist on my 



\ 



336 SEEING AND HEARING 

family pew not being touched. If I had to sit in 
an open seat, I should never get a wink of sleep 
again." 

A country home left its mark for all time on 
those who were brought up in it. The sons 
played cricket and went bat-fowling with the 
village boys, and not seldom joined with them in 
a poaching enterprise in the paternal preserves. 
However popular or successful or happy a Public- 
School boy might be at Eton or Harrow, he 
counted the days till he could' return to his pony 
and his gun, his ferrets and rat-trap and fishing- 
rod. Amid all the toil and worry of active life, 
he looked back lovingly to the corner of the 
cover where he shot his first pheasant, or the 
precise spot in the middle of the Vale where 
he first saw a fox killed, and underwent the dis- 
gusting baptism of blood. 

Girls, living more continuously at home, entered 
even more intimately into the daily life of the 
place. Their morning rides led them across the 
village green ; their afternoon drives were often 
steered by the claims of this or that cottage to 
a visit. They were taught as soon as they could 
toddle never to enter a door without knocking, 
never to sit down without being asked, and never 
to call at meal-time. 

They knew every one in the village — old and 
young ; played with the babies, taught the boys 
in Sunday School, carried savoury messes to the 
old and impotent, read by the sick-beds, and 



TOWN V. COUNTRY 337 

brought flowers for the coffin. Mamma knitted 
comforters and dispensed warm clothing, organ- 
ized relief in hard winters and times of epidemic, 
and found places for the hobbledehoys of both 
sexes. The pony-boy and the scullery-maid were 
pretty sure to be products of the village. Very 
likely the young-ladies-maid was a village girl 
whom the doctor had pronounced too delicate 
for factory or farm. I have seen an excited 
young groom staring his eyes out of his head 
at the Eton and Harrow match, and exclaiming 
with rapture at a good catch, ^' It was my young 
governor as ' scouted ' that. 'E's nimble, ain't 'e ? " 
And I well remember an ancient stable-helper at 
a country house in Buckinghamshire who was 
called ''Old Bucks," because he had never slept 
out of his native county, and very rarely out of 
his native village, and had spent his whole life 
in the service of one family. 

Of course, when so much of the impression- 
able part of life was lived amid the " sweet, sincere 
surroundings of country life," there grew up, 
between the family at the Hall and the families 
in the village, a feeling which, in spite of our 
national unsentimentality, had a chivalrous and 
almost feudal tone. The interest of the poor in 
the life and doings of " The Family " was keen and 
genuine. The English peasant is too much a 
gentleman to be a flatterer, and compliments 
were often bestowed in very unexpected forms. 
"They do tell me as 'is understanding's no w^orse 

Y 



338 SEEING AND HEARING 

than it always were," was a ploughman's way of 
saying that the old squire was in full possession 
of his faculties. ^'We call 'im ''Is Lordship,' 
because 'e's so old and so cunning," was another's 
description of a famous pony. *'Ah, I know 
you're but a poor creature at the best ! " was 
the recognized way of complimenting a lady on 
what she considered her bewitching and romantic 
delicacy. 

But these eccentricities were merely verbal, and 
under them lay a deep vein of genuine and last- 
ing regard. " I've lived under four dukes and 
four 'ousekeepers, and I'm not going to be put 
upon in my old age ! " was the exclamation of an 
ancient poultry-woman, whose dignity had been 
offended by some irregularity touching her Christ- 
mas dinner. When the daughter of the house 
married and went into a far country, she was sure 
to find some emigrant from her old home who 
welcomed her with effusion, and was full of en- 
quiries about his lordship and her ladyship, and 
Miss Pinkerton the governess, and whether Mr. 
Wheeler was still coachman, and who lived now at 
the entrance-lodge. Whether the sons got com- 
missions, or took ranches, or become curates in 
slums, or contested remote constituencies, some 
grinning face was sure to emerge from the crowd 
with, ''You know me, sir? Bill Juffs, as used to 
go bird's-nesting with you ; " or, " You remember 
my old dad, my lord ? He used to shoe your black 
pony." 



TOWN V. COUNTRY 339 

When the eldest son came of age, his con- 
descension in taking this step was hailed with 
genuine enthusiasm. When he came into his king- 
dom, there might be some grumbling if he went 
in for small economies, or altered old practices, 
or was a *'hard man" on the Bench or at the 
Board of Guardians ; but, if he went on in the 
good-natured old ways, the traditional loyalty 
was unabated. 

Lord Shaftesbury wrote thus about the birth of 
his eldest son's eldest son : ^^ My little village is all 
agog with the birth of a son and heir in the very 
midst of them, the first, it is believed, since 1600, 
when the first Lord Shaftesbury was born. The 
christening yesterday was an ovation. Every 
cottage had flags and flowers. We had three 
triumphal arches ; and all the people were exult- 
ing. * He is one of us.' * He is a fellow-villager.' 
*We have now got a lord of our own.' This is 
really gratifying. I did not think that there re- 
mained so much of the old respect and affection 
between peasant and proprietor, landlord and 
tenant." 

Whether the kind of relation thus described has 
utterly perished I do not know; but certainly it 
has very greatly diminished, and the cause of the 
diminution is that people live less and less in their 
country houses, and more and more in London. 
For those who are compelled by odious necessity 
to sell or let their hereditary homes one has nothing 
but compassion ; in itself a severe trial, it is made 



340 SEEING AND HEARING 

still sharper to well-conditioned people by the 
sense that the change is at least as painful to the 
poor as to themselves. But for those who, having 
both a country and a London house, deliberately 
concentrate themselves on the town, forsake the 
country, and abjure the duties which are insepar- 
able from their birthright, one can only feel 
Charles Lamb's " imperfect sympathy." The 
causes which induce this dereliction and its results 
on society and on the country may be discussed 
in another chapter. 



XLVI 

HOME 

I WAS Speaking just now of the growing tendency 
to desert the country in favour of London. I said 
that it was difficult to feel sympathy with people 
who voluntarily abandon Home, and all the duties 
and pleasures which Home implies, in favour of 
Lennox Gardens or Portman Square ; but that 
one felt a lively compassion for those who make 
the exchange under the pressure of — 

" Bitter constraint and sad occasion dear." 

Here, again, is another social change. In old 

days, when people wished to economize, it was 

London that they deserted. They sold the ^^amily 

mansion " in Portland Place or Eaton Square ; 

and, if they revisited the glimpses of the social 

moon, they took a furnished house for six weeks 

in the summer : the rest of the year they spent 

in the country. This plan was a manifold saving. 

There was no rent to pay, and only very small 

rates, for every one knows that country houses 

were shamefully under-assessed. Carriages did 

not require repainting every season, and no new 

clothes were wanted. ^'What can it matter what 

341 



342 SEEING AND HEARING 

we wear here, where every one knows who we 
are ? " The products of the park, the home farm, 
the hothouses, and the kitchen-garden kept the 
family supplied with food. A brother magnate 
staying at Beaudesert with the famous Lord 
Anglesey waxed enthusiastic over the mutton, 
and said, *' Excuse my asking you a plain ques- 
tion, but how much does this excellent mutton 
cost you?" "Cost me?" screamed the hero. 
*' Good Gad, it costs me nothing ! It's my own," 
and he was beyond measure astonished when his 
statistical guest proved that "his own" cost him 
about a guinea per pound. In another great 
house, conducted on strictly economical lines, 
it was said that the very numerous family were 
reared exclusively on rabbits and garden- stuff, 
and that their enfeebled constitutions and dismal 
appearance in later life were due to this ascetic 
regimen. 

People were always hospitable in the country, 
but rural entertaining was not a very costly busi- 
ness. The *^ three square meals and a snack," 
which represent the minimum requirement of the 
present day, are a huge development of the system 
which prevailed in my youth. Breakfast had 
already grown from the tea and coffee, and rolls 
and eggs, which Macaulay tells us were deemed 
sufficient at Holland House, to an affair of covered 
dishes. Luncheon-parties were sometimes given 
— terrible ceremonies which lasted from two to 
four ; but the ordinary luncheon of the family 



HOME 343 

was really a snack from the servants' joint or the 
children's rice-pudding ; and five o'clock tea was 
actually not invented. To remember, as I do, 
the foundress of that divine refreshment seems 
like having known Stephenson or ]enner. 

Dinner was substantial enough in all con- 
science, and the wine nearly as heavy as the food. 
Imagine quenching one's thirst with sherry in 
the dog days ! Yet so we did, till about half- 
way through dinner, and then, on great occasions, 
a dark-coloured rill of champagne began to trickle 
into the saucer-shaped glasses. At the epoch of 
cheese, port made its appearance in company with 
home-brewed beer ; and, as soon as the ladies 
and the schoolboys departed, the men applied 
themselves, with much seriousness of purpose, 
to the consumption of claret which was really 
vinous. 

In this kind of hospitality there was no great 
expense. People made very little difference be- 
tween their way of living when they were alone 
and their way of living when they had company. 
A visitor who wished to make himself agreeable 
sometimes brought down a basket of fish or a 
barrel of oysters from London ; and, if one had 
no deer of one's own, the arrival of a haunch 
from a neighbour's or kinsman's park was the 
signal for a gathering of local gastronomers. 

And in matters other than meals life went on 
very much the same whether you had friends 
staying with you or whether you were alone. 



344 SEEING AND HEARING 

Your guests drove and rode, and walked and 
shot, according to their tastes and the season of 
the year. They were carried off, more or less 
willingly, to see the sights of the neighbourhood — 
ruined castles, restored cathedrals, famous views. 
In summer there might be a picnic or a croquet- 
party ; in winter a lawn-meet or a ball. But all 
these entertainments were of the most homely 
and inexpensive character. There was very little 
outlay, no fuss, and no display. People, who 
were compelled by stress of financial weather to 
put into their country houses and remain there 
till the storm was over, contrived to economize 
and yet be comfortable. They simply lived their 
ordinary lives until things righted themselves, 
and very likely did not attempt London again 
until they were bringing out another daughter, 
or had to make a home for a son in the Guards. 

But now an entirely different spirit prevails. 
People seem to have lost the power of living 
quietly and happily in their country homes. They 
all have imbibed the urban philosophy of George 
Warrington, who, when Pen gushed about the 
country with its 'Mong calm days, and long calm 
evenings," brutally replied, ^^ Devilish long, and 
a great deal too calm. I've tried 'em." People 
of that type desert the country simply because 
they are bored by it. They feel with Mr. Luke 
in '^The New RepubUc," who, after talking about 
*Miberal air," *^ sedged brooks," and ^'meadow 
grass," admitted that it would be a horrid bore 



HOME 345 

to have no other society than the clergyman 
of the parish, and no other topics of conversa- 
tion than Justification by Faith and the measles. 
They do not care for the country in itself ; 
they have no eye for its beauty, no sense of 
its atmosphere, no memory for its traditions. 
It is only made endurable to them by sport 
and gambling and boisterous house-parties ; and, 
when from one cause or another these resources 
fail, they are frankly bored and long for London. 
They are no longer content, as our fathers were, 
to entertain their friends with hospitable sim- 
plicity. So profoundly has all society been 
vulgarized by the worship of the Golden Calf 
that, unless people can vie with alien million- 
aires in the sumptuousness with which they 'Mo 
you " — delightful phrase, — they prefer not to en- 
tertain at all. An emulous ostentation has killed 
hospitality. 

So now, when a season of financial pressure 
sets in, people shut up their country houses, let 
their shooting, cut themselves off with a sigh of 
relief from all the unexciting duties and simple 
pleasures of the Home, and take refuge from 
boredom in the delights of London. In London 
life has no duties. Little is expected of one, 
and nothing required. One can live on a larger 
or a smaller scale according to one's taste or 
one's purse ; cramp oneself in a doll's house 
in Mayfair, or expand one's wings in a Kensing- 
tonian mansion : or even contract oneself into 



346 SEEING AND HEARING 

a flat, or hide one's diminished head in the 
upper storey of a shop. One can entertain or 
not entertain, spend much or spend httle, live 
on one's friends or be lived on by them, exactly 
as one finds most convenient : and unquestion- 
ably social freedom is a great element in human 
happiness. 

For many natures London has an attractiveness 
which is all its own, and yet to indulge one's taste 
for it may be a grave dereliction of duty. The 
State is built upon the Home ; and, as a training- 
place for social virtue, there can surely be no 
comparison between a home in the country and a 
home in London. 

''Home! Sweet Home!" Yes. (I am quoting 
now from my friend, Henry Scott Holland.) That 
is the song that goes straight to the heart of every 
English man and woman. For forty years we 
have never asked Madame Adelina Patti to sing 
anything else. The unhappy, decadent, Latin races 
have not even a word in their languages by which 
to express it, poor things ! Home is the secret of 
our honest British Protestant virtues. It is the 
only nursery of our Anglo-Saxon citizenship. 
Back to it our far-flung children turn with all their 
memories aflame. They may lapse into rough 
ways, but they keep something sound at the core so 
long as they are faithful to the old Home. There 
is still a tenderness in the voice, and tears are in 
their eyes, as they speak together of the days that 
can never die out of their lives, when they were at 



HOME 347 

home in the old familiar places, with father and 
mother in the healthy gladness of their childhood. 
Ah 1 ^ 

*' Home ! Sweet Home ! 
There's no place like Home." 

That is what we all repeat, and all believe, and 
cheer to the echo. And, behind all our British 
complacency about it, nobody would deny the vital 
truth that there is in this belief of ours. What- 
ever tends to make the Home beautiful, attractive, 
romantic — to associate it with the ideas of pure 
pleasure and high duty — to connect it not only with 
all that was happiest but also with all that was 
best in early years — whatever fulfils these purposes 
purifies the fountains of national life. A home, to 
be perfectly a home, should '* incorporate tradition, 
and prolong the reign of the dead." It should 
animate those who dwell in it to virtue and benefi- 
cence by reminding them of what others did, who 
went before them in the same place and lived amid 
the same surroundings. 



XLVII 

HOSPITALITY 

In my last chapter I was deploring the modern 
tendency of society to desert the country and culti- 
vate London. And the reason why I deplore it is 
that all the educating influences of the Home are so 
infinitely weaker in the town than in the country. 
In a London home there is nothing to fascinate 
the eye. The contemplation of the mews and the 
chimney-pots through the back windows of the 
nursery will not elevate even the most impressible 
child. There is no mystery, no dreamland, no 
Enchanted Palace, no Bluebeard's Chamber, in a 
stucco mansion built by Cubitt or a palace of terra- 
cotta on the Cadogan estate. There can be no 
traditions of the past, no inspiring memories of 
virtuous ancestry, in a house which your father 
bought five years ago and of which the previous 
owners are not known to you even by name. 
"The Square" or ''the Gardens" are sorry sub- 
stitutes for the Park and the Pleasure-grounds, 
the Common and the Downs. Crossing-sweepers 
are a deserving folk, but you cannot cultivate 
those intimate relations with them which bind 
you to the lodge-keeper at home, or to the old 

women in the almshouses, or the octogenarian 

348 



HOSPITALITY 349 

waggoner who has driven your father's team 
ever since he was ten years old. St. Peter's, 
Eaton Square, or All Saints, Margaret Street, 
may be beautifully ornate, and the congrega- 
tion what Lord Beaconsfield called "brisk and 
modish " ; but they can never have the romantic 
charm of the country church where you were 
confirmed side by side with the keeper's son, or 
proposed to the vicar's daughter when you were 
wreathing holly round the lectern. 

Then, again, as regards social relations with 
friends and neighbours. ^'An emulous ostenta- y^.v^^"^ 
tion has destroyed hospitality." This I believe is 
absolutely true, and it is one of the worst changes 
which I have seen. I have already spoken of 
hospitality as practised in the country. Now I 
will say a word about hospitality in London. 

Of course rich people always gave banquets 
from time to time, and these were occasions when, 
in Lord Beaconsfield's drolly vulgar phrase, '' the 
dinner was stately, as befits the high nobility." 
They were ceremonious observances, conducted 
on the constitutional principle of " cutlet for 
cutlet," and must always have been regarded by 
all concerned in them, whether as hosts or guests, 
in the light of duty rather than of pleasure. 
Twenty people woke that morning with the im- 
pression that something was to be gone through 
before bedtime, which they would be glad enough 
to escape. Each of the twenty went to bed that 
night more or less weary and ruffled, but sus- 



350 SEEING AND HEARING 

tained by the sense that a social duty had been 
performed. Banquets, however, at the worst were 
only periodical events. Real hospitality was con- 
stant and informal. 

^'Come and dine to-night. Eight o'clock. Pot 
luck. Don't dress." 

^' My dear, I am going to bring back two or 
three men from the House. Don't put off dinner 
in case we are kept by a division." 

^' I am afraid I must be going back. I am only 
paired till eleven. Good-night, and so many thanks." 

" Good-night ; you will always find some dinner 
here on Government nights. Do look in again ! " 

These are the cheerful echoes of parliamen- 
tary homes in the older and better days of un- 
ostentatious entertaining, and those ''pot luck" 
dinners often played an important part in politi- 
cal manoeuvre. Sir George Trevelyan, whose early 
manhood was passed in the thick of parliamentary 
society, tells us, in a footnote to ''The Ladies in 
Parliament," that in the season of 1866 there was 
much gossip over the fact of Lord Russell having 
entertained Mr. Bright at dinner, and that people 
were constantly — 

"Discussing whether Bright can scan and understand 

the lines 
About the Wooden Horse of Troy ; and when and 

where he dines. 
Though gentlemen should blush to talk as if they 

cared a button 
Because one night in Chesham Place he ate his slice 

of mutton." 



HOSPITALITY 351 

Quite apart from parliamentary strategy, im- 
promptu entertaining in what was called " a 
friendly way" had its special uses in the social 
system. There is a delicious passage in *^ Lothair " 
describing that hero's initiation into an easier and 
more graceful society than that in which he had 
been reared : ^' He had been a guest at the oc- 
casional banquets of his uncle, but these were 
festivals of the Picts and Scots ; rude plenty and 
coarse splendour, with noise instead of conver- 
sation, and a tumult of obstructive dependants, 
who impeded by their want of skill the very con- 
venience which they were purposed to facilitate." 
An amazing sentence indeed, but like all Lord 
Beaconsfield's writings, picturesquely descriptive, 
and happily contrasted with the succeeding scene : 
*'A table covered with flowers, bright with fanci- 
ful crystal, and porcelain that had belonged to 
Sovereigns who had given a name to its colour 
or its form. As for those present, all seemed 
grace and gentleness, from the radiant daughters 
of the house to the noiseless attendants who anti- 
cipated all his wants, and sometimes seemed to 
suggest his wishes." 

The mention of '' Lothair " reminds people of 
my date that thirty years ago we knew a house 
justly famed for the excellent marriages which 
the daughters made. There banquets were un- 
known, and even dinners by invitation very rare. 
The father used to collect young men from 
Lord's, or the Lobby, or the Club, or wherever 



352 SEEING AND HEARING 

he had been spending the afternoon. Servants 
were soon dismissed — '' It is such a bore to have 
them staring at one" — and the daughters of the 
house waited on the guests. Here obviously were 
matrimonial openings not to be despised ; and, 
even in families where there were no ulterior 
objects to be served, these free-and-easy enter- 
tainings went on from February to July. Short 
invitations, pleasant company, and genuine friend- 
liness were the characteristics of these gather- 
ings. Very often the dinner was carved on the 
table. One could ask for a second slice or another 
wing without feeling greedy, and the claret and 
amontillado were within the reach of every guest. 
This, I consider, was genuine hospitality, for it 
was natural, easy, and unostentatious. 

But now, according to all accounts, the spirit of 
entertaining is utterly changed. A dinner is not 
so much an opportunity of pleasing your friends as 
of airing your own magnificence ; and ostentation, 
despicable in itself, is doubly odious because it is 
emulous. If A has a good cook, B must have a 
better. If C gave you ortolans stuffed with truffles, 
D must have truffles stuffed with ortolans. If the 
E's table is piled with strawberries in April, the F's 
must retaliate with orchids at a guinea a blossom. 
G is a little inclined to swagger about his wife's 
pearl necklace, and H is bound in honour to 
decorate Mrs. H with a riviere which belonged to 
the crown jewels of France. 

And, as with the food and the decorations, so 



HOSPITALITY 353 

also with the company. Here, again, Emulous 
Ostentation carries all before it. Mr. Goldbug is a 
Yahoo, but he made his millions in South Africa 
and spends them in Park Lane. Lord Heath is 
the most abandoned bore in Christendom, but he 
is an authority at Newmarket. Lady Bellair has 
had a notoriously chequered career, but she plays 
bridge in exalted circles. As Lord Crewe sings of 
a similar enchantress — 

" From reflections we shrink ; 
And of comment are chary ; 
But her face is so pink, 

And it don't seem to vary." 

However, she is unquestionably smart ; and 
Goldbug is a useful man to know ; and we are not 
going to be outdone by the Cashingtons, who got 
Heath to dine with them twice last vear. So we 
invite our guests, not because we like them or 
admire them, for that in these cases is impossible ; 
not — heaven knows — because they are beautiful or 
famous or witty ; but because they are the right 
people to have in one's house, and we will have the 
right people or perish in the attempt. 



XLVIII 

OSTENTATION 

It is many a long year since I saw the inside of a 
ballroom, but by all accounts very much the same 
change has come over the spirit of ball-giving as of 
dinner-giving. Here again the " Emulous Ostenta- 
tion" which I have described is the enemy. When 
I first grew up, there were infinitely more balls 
than now. From Easter till August there were 
at least two every night, and a hostess counted 
herself lucky if she had only one rival to con- 
tend with. Between ii p.m. and 2 A.M. Grosvenor 
Place was blocked by the opposing streams of 
carriages going from Mayfair to Belgravia, and 
from Belgravia to Mayfair. There were three or 
four really great Houses — " Houses "- with a capital 
H — such as Grosvenor House, Stafford House, 
Dudley House, and Montagu House — where a 
ball could scarcely help being an event — or, as 
Pennialinus would say, ^^a function." But, put- 
ting these on one side, the great mass of hostesses 
contrived to give excellent balls, where every 
one went and every one enjoyed themselves, 
with very little fuss and no ostentation. The 

drawing-room of an ordinary house in Belgravia 

354 



OSTENTATION 355 

or Grosvenor Square made a perfectly sufficient 
ballroom. A good floor, a good band, and plenty 
of light, were the only essentials of success. 
Decoration was represented by such quaint de- 
vices as pink muslin on the banisters, or green 
festoons dependent from the chandelier. A good 
supper was an additional merit ; and, if the host 
produced his best champagne, he was held in 
just esteem by dancing men. But yet I well 
remember a cold supper at a ball which the pre- 
sent King and Queen attended, in 1881, and no 
one grumbled, though perhaps the young bloods 
thought it a little old-fashioned. The essence 
of a good ball was not expense or display 
or overwhelming preparation, but the certainty 
that you would meet your friends. Boys and 
girls danced, and married women looked on, or 
only stole a waltz when their juniors were at 
supper. In those days a ball was really a 
merry-making. 

Nowadays I gather from the Morning Post that 
balls are comparatively rare events, but what they 
lack in frequency they make up in ostentation. 
As to the sums which the Heits and the Heims, 
the Le Beers and the De Porters, lavish on one 
night's entertainment I hear statistical accounts 
which not only outrage economy but stagger 
credibility. Here again the rushing flood of ill- 
gotten gold has overflowed its banks, and polluted 
the ''crystal river of unreproved enjoyment." 

There is yet another form of entertainment 



356 SEEING AND HEARING 

which Emulous Ostentation has destroyed. A 
few years ago there still were women in London 
who could hold a *' salon." Of these gatherings 
the principal attraction was the hostess, and, in 
a secondary degree, the agreeableness of the 
people whom she could gather round her. Of 
fuss and finery, decoration and display, there 
was absolutely nothing. A typical instance of 
what I mean will perhaps recur to the memory 
of some who read this chapter. Picture to yourself 
two not very large and rather dingy rooms. The 
furniture is dark and old-fashioned — mahogany 
and rosewood, with here and there a good cabinet 
or a French armchair. No prettiness of lace and 
china ; no flowers ; and not very much light. 
Books everywhere, some good engravings, a 
comfortable sofa, and a tray of tea and coffee. 
That was all. It is difficult to conceive a less 
ostentatious or a more economical mode of enter- 
taining ; yet the lady who presided over that 
'* salon " had been for fifty years one of the most 
celebrated women in Europe ; had been em- 
braced by Napoleon ; had flirted with the Allied 
Sovereigns ; had been described by Byron ; had 
discussed scholarship with Grote, and statecraft 
with Metternich ; had sate to Lawrence, and 
caballed with Antonelli. Even in old age and 
decrepitude she opened her rooms to her friends 
every evening in the year, and never, even in 
the depths of September, found her court deserted. 
Certainly it was a social triumph, and one has 



OSTENTATION 357 

only to compare it with the scene in the stock- 
broker's saloon — the blaze of electric light, the 
jungle of flowers, the furniture from Sinclair's, 
the pictures from Christie's — and to contrast the 
assembled guests. Instead of celebrities, noto- 
rieties — woman at once under-dressed and over- 
dressed ; men with cent, per cent, written deep 
in every line of their expressive countenances ; 
and, at the centre of the throng, a hostess in a 
diamond crown, who conducts her correspon- 
dence by telegraph, because her spelling is a 
little shaky and mistakes in telegrams are charit- 
ably attributed to the clerks. 

One of the worst properties of Emulous Osten- 
tation is that it naturally affects its victims with 
an insatiable thirst for money. If Mrs. Tymmyns 
in Onslow Gardens is to have as good a dinner, 
and as smart a victoria, and as large a tiara, as 
her friend Mrs. Goldbug in Park Lane, it is 
obvious that Mr. Tymmyns must find the money 
somehow. Who wills the end wills the means ; 
and, if social exigencies demand a larger outlay, 
the Tymmynses cannot afford to be too scrupu- 
lous about their method of providing for it. I 
suppose it is this consideration which makes us 
just now a nation of gamblers, whereas our 
more respectable but less adventurous fathers were 
well content to be a nation of shopkeepers. 

Of course, in all ages there has been a gambling 
clique in society ; but in old days it kept itself, 
as the saying is, to itself. Of necessity it always 



358 SEEING AND HEARING 

was on the look-out for neophytes to initiate 
and to pillage, but the non-gambling majority 
of society regarded the gambling minority with 
horror ; and a man who palpably meant to 
make money out of a visit to a country house 
would probably have been requested to with- 
draw. *^ Order a fly for Mr. L. at eleven o'clock," 
said old Lord Crewe to the butler when a guest 
had committed a social atrocity under his roof. 
*' Thank you, Lord Crewe," said Mr. L., ^^but not 
for me. I am not going to-day." ^'Oh yes, you 
are," responded the host, and secreted himself in 
his private apartments till the offender had been 
duly extruded. Similar justice would, I think, 
have been dealt out to a gambler who rooked 
the young and the inexperienced. Not so to- 
day ; the pigeon, however unfledged and tender, is 
the appointed prey of the rook, and the venerable 
bird who does the plucking is entirely undeterred 
by any considerations of pity, shame, or fear. ^^ Is 
he any good ?" is a question which circulates round 
the Board of Green Cloth whenever a new face fresh 
from Oxford or Sandhurst is noted in the social 
throng. *' Oh yes, he's all right ; I know his people," 
may be the cheerful response ; or else, in a very 
different note, '^ No, he hasn't got a feather to fly 
with." Fortunate is the youth on whom this dis- 
paraging verdict is pronounced, for in that case he 
may escape the benevolent attentions of the 

" Many-wintered crow 
That leads the gambling rookery home." 



OSTENTATION 359 

But even impecuniosity does not always protect 
the inexperienced. A lady who had lived for 
some years in the country returned to London 
not long ago, and, enumerating the social changes 
which she had observed, she said, *' People seem 
to marry on ^£500 a year and yet have diamond 
tiaras." It was, perhaps, a too hasty generalization, 
but an instance in point immediately recurred to 
my recollection. A young couple had married 
with no other means of subsistence than smart- 
ness, good looks, and pleasant manners. After a 
prolonged tour round the country houses of their 
innumerable friends, they settled down at Wool- 
wich. '^Why Woolwich?" was the natural en- 
quiry ; and the reason, when at length it came 
to light, was highly characteristic of the age. It 
appeared that these kind young people used to 
give nice little evening parties, invite the " Gentle- 
men Cadets " from Woolwich Academy, and make 
them play cards for money. The device of set- 
ting up housekeeping on the pocket-money of 
babes and sucklings is thoroughly symptomatic 
of our decadence. Emulous Ostentation makes 
every one want more money than he has, and at 
the same time drugs all scruples of conscience 
as to the method of obtaining it. 



XLIX 

PRINCIPLE AND PREJUDICE 

Mr. J. A. Froude once told me that he did not 
in the least mind the accusation which was brought 
against him (certainly not without reason) of being 
prejudiced. ''A good stiff prejudice/' he said, 
*' is a very useful thing. It is like a rusty weather- 
cock. It will yield to a strong and long-continued 
blast of conviction, but it does not veer round 
and round in compliance with every shifting 
current of opinion." 

What Mr. Froude expressed other people felt, 
though perhaps they would not have cared to 
avow it so honestly. 

One of the most notable changes which I have 
seen is the decay of prejudice. In old days 
people felt strongly and spoke strongly, and acted 
as they spoke. In every controversy they were 
absolutely certain that they were right and that 
the other side was wrong, and they did not mince 
their words when they expressed their opinions. 

The first Lord Leicester of the present creation 
(1775-1844) told my father (1807-1894) that, when 
he was a boy, his grandfather had taken him on 

his knee and said, '' Now, my dear Tom, whatever 

360 



PRINCIPLE AND PREJUDICE 361 

else you do in life, mind you never trust a 
Tory ; " and Lord Leicester added, *' I never have, 
and, by George, I never will." On the other 
hand, when Dr. Longley, afterwards Archbishop 
of Canterbury, did homage on his appointment to 
the see of Ripon, King William IV. said, *' Bishop 
of Ripon, I charge you, as you shall answer 
before Almighty God, that you never by word or 

deed give encouragement to those d d Whigs, 

who would upset the Church of England." 

John Keble, the gentle saint of the Tractarian 
movement, when he saw the Whigs preparing to 
attack the property of the Church, proclaimed 
that the time had come when ^'scoundrels should 
be called scoundrels." And the Tractarians had 
no monopoly of vigorous invective, for, when 
their famous ^' Tract XC." incurred the censure of 
an Evangelical dean, he urbanely remarked that 
^*he would be sorry to trust the author of that 
tract with his purse." 

Macaulay, on the morning after a vital division, 
in which the Whigs had saved their places by 
seventy-nine votes, wrote triumphantly to his 
sister — 

*' So hang the dirty Tories, and let them starve and pine. 
And hurrah! for the majority of glorious seventy-nine." 

The same cordial partisan wrote of a political 
opponent that he was ^'a bad, a very bad, man; 
a disgrace to politics and to literature ; " and, 
of an acquaintance who had offended him socially, 



362 SEEING AND HEARING 

'^ his powers gone ; his spite immortal — a dead 
nettle." 

The great and good Lord Shaftesbury, repudi- 
ating the theology of ^' Ecce Homo/' pronounced it 
'' the most pestilential book ever vomited from 
the jav^s of Hell ; " and, dividing his political 
favours with admirable impartiality, he denounced 
''the brazen faces, low insults, and accursed 
effrontery " of the Radicals ; declared that Mr. 
Gladstone's '^ public life had long been an effort 
to retain his principles and yet not lose his 
position ;" and dismissed Lord Beaconsfield as "a 
leper, without principle, without feeling, without 
regard to anything, human or divine, beyond his 
personal ambition." In the same spirit of hearty 
prejudice, Bishop Wilberforce deplored the politi- 
cal exigencies which had driven his friend Glad- 
stone into ''the foul arms of the Whigs." In 
the opposite camp was ranged a lady, well re- 
membered in the inner circles of Whiggery, who 
never would enter a four-wheeled cab until she 
had elicited from the driver that he was not a 
Puseyite and was a Whig. 

'' Mamma," asked a little girl of Whig parent- 
age, who from her cradle had heard nothing but 
denunciation of her father's political opponents, 
"are Tories born wicked, or do they grow 
wicked afterwards ? " And her mother judiciously 
replied, '' My dear, they are born wicked and 
grow worse." 

But alas ! they are '' gone down to Hades, 



PRINCIPLE AND PREJUDICE 363 

even many stalwart sons of heroes," — with King 
William at their head, and Lord Shaftesbury and 
Lord Leicester, and Keble and Macaulay and 
Froude in his wake — men who knew what they 
believed, and, knowing it, were not ashamed to 
avow it, and saw little to praise or like in the 
adherents of a contrary opinion. 

They are gone, and we are left — an unprejudiced, 
but an invertebrate and a flaccid, generation. 
No one seems to believe anything very firmly. 
No one has the slightest notion of putting him- 
self to any inconvenience for his belief. No one 
dreams of disliking or distrusting a political or 
religious opponent, or of treating difference of 
opinion as a line of social cleavage. 

In old days, King Leopold of Belgium told 
Bishop Wilberforce that ^' the only position for 
a Church was to say, ' Believe this or you are 
damned.' " To-day nothing in religion is re- 
garded as unquestionably true. When the late 
Archbishop Benson first became acquainted with 
society in London, he asked, in shocked amaze- 
ment, '^ What do these people believe ? " — and 
no very satisfactory answer was forthcoming. 
If society has any religious beliefs (and this is 
more than questionable), it holds them with the 
loosest grasp, and is on the easiest terms of 
intercourse with every other belief and unbelief. 
The most fashionable teachers of religion have 
one eye nervously fixed on the ever-shifting 
currents of negation, talk plausibly about putting 



364 SEEING AND HEARING 

the Faith in its proper relation with modern 
thought, and toil panting in the wake of science ; 
only to find each fresh theory exploded just at 
the moment when they have managed to appre- 
hend it. 

We used to be taught in our nurseries that, when 
" Old Daddy Longlegs wouldn't say his prayers," it 
was our duty to ^'Take him by the left leg and 
throw him downstairs ; " and the student of folklore 
will be pleased to observe in this ditty the imme- 
morial inclination of mankind to punish people 
who will not square their religion with ours. The 
spirit of religious persecution dies hard, but the 
decay of prejudice has sapped its strength. It does 
not thrive in the atmosphere of modern indifferent- 
ism, and admirable ladies who believe that Ritu- 
alists ride donkeys on Palm Sunday and sacrifice 
lambs on Good Friday find it difficult to revive 
the cry of '^ No Popery" with any practical effect. 

The decay of prejudice in the sphere of politics 
is even more remarkable than in that of religion. 
In old days, political agreement was a strong arid 
a constraining bond. When people saw a clear 
right and wrong in politics, they governed their 
private as well as their pubHc life accordingly. 
People who held the same political beliefs lived 
and died together. In society and hospitality, in 
work and recreation, in journalism and literature — 
even in such seemingly indifferent matters as art 
and the drama — they were closely and permanently 
associated. 



PRINCIPLE AND PREJUDICE 365 

Eton was supposed to cherish a romantic affec- 
tion for the Stuarts, and therefore to be a fit train- 
ing place for sucking Tories ; Harrow had always 
been Hanoverian, and therefore attracted little 
Whigs to its Hill. Oxford, with its Caroline theo- 
logy and Jacobite tradition, was the Tory univer- 
sity ; Cambridge was the nursing-mother of Whigs, 
until Edinburgh, under the influence of Jeffrey and 
Brougham, tore her babes from her breast. In 
society you must choose between the Duchess 
of Devonshire and the Duchess of Gordon, or, 
in a later generation, between Lady Holland and 
Lady Jersey. In clubland the width of St. James's 
Street marked a dividing line of abysmal depth ; 
and to this day ''Grillon's" remains the memorial 
of an attempt, then unique, to bring politicians of 
opposite sides together in social intercourse. On 
the one side stood Scott — where Burke had stood 
before him — the Guardian Angel of Monarchy 
and Aristocracy : on the other were Shelley and 
Byron, and (till they turned their coats) the emanci- 
pated singers of Freedom and Humanity. The 
two political parties had even their favourite actors, 
and the Tories swore by Kemble while the Whigs 
roared for Kean. 

Then, as now, the Tories were a wealthy, 
powerful, and highly-organized confederacy. The 
Whigs were notoriously a family party. From 
John, Lord Gower, who died in 1754, and was 
the great-great-great-grandfather of the present 
Duke of Sutherland, descend all the Gowers, 



366 SEEING AND HEARING 

Levesons, Howards, Cavendishes, Grosvenors, Har- 
courts, and Russells who walk on the face of 
the earth. It is a goodly company. Well might 
Thackeray exclaim, ^' I'm not a Whig ; but oh, 
how I should like to be one ! " 

Lord Beaconsfield described in ^'Coningsby" 
how the Radical manufacturer, sending his boy to 
Eton, charged him to form no intimacies with his 
father's hereditary foes. This may have been a 
flight of fancy ; but certainly, when a lad was 
going to Oxford or Cambridge, his parents and 
family friends would warn him against entering 
into friendships with the other side. The Uni- 
versity Clubs which he joined and the votes which 
he gave at the Union were watched with anxious 
care. He was early initiated into the political 
society to which his father belonged. Extraneous 
intimacies were regarded with the most suspicious 
anxiety. Mothers did all they knew to make their 
darlings acquainted with daughters of families 
whose political faith was pure, and I have myself 
learned, by not remote tradition, the indignant 
horror which pervaded a great Whig family when 
the heir-presumptive to its honcfurs married the 
daughter of a Tory Lord Chamberlain. ^'That 
girl will ruin the politics of the family and undo 
the work of two hundred years" was the prophecy; 
and I have seen it fulfilled. 



CULTURE 

One of the social changes which most impresses 
me is the decay of intellectual cultivation. This 
may sound paradoxical in an age which habitually 
talks so much about Education and Culture ; but 
I am persuaded that it is true. Dilettantism is 
universal, and a smattering of erudition, infinitely 
more offensive than honest and manly ignorance, 
has usurped the place which was formerly occu- 
pied by genuine and liberal learning. My own 
view of the subject is probably tinged by the fact 
that I was born a Whig and brought up in a 
Whiggish society ; for the Whigs were rather 
specially the allies of learning, and made it a point 
of honour to know, though never to parade, the 
best that has been thought and written. Very 
likely they had no monopoly of culture, and the 
Tories were just as well-informed. But a man 
*^ belongs to his belongings," and one can only 
describe what one has seen ; and here the contrast 
between Past and Present is palpable enough. I 
am not now thinking of professed scholars and 
students, such as Lord Stanhope and Sir Charles 

Bunbury, or of professed blue-stockings, such as 

367 



368 SEEING AND HEARING 

Barbarina Lady Dacre and Georgiana Lady Chat- 
terton ; but of ordinary men and women of good 
family and good position, who had received the 
usual education of their class and had profited 
by it. . 

Mr. Gladstone used to say that, in his school- 
days at Eton, it was possible to learn much or 
to learn nothing, but it was not possible to learn 
superficially. And one saw the same in after- 
life. What people professed to know they knew. 
The affectation of culture was despised ; and 
ignorance, where it existed, was honestly con- 
fessed. For example, every one knew Italian, 
but no one pretended to know German. I re- 
member men who had never been to a Uni- 
versity but had passed straight from a Public 
School to a Cavalry Regiment or the House of 
Commons, and who yet could quote Horace as 
easily as the present generation quotes Kipling. 
These people inherited the traditions of Mrs. 
Montagu, who '^vindicated the genius of Shake- 
speare against the calumnies of Voltaire," and 
they knew the greatest poet of all time with an 
absolute ease and familiarity. They did not 
trouble themselves about various readings and 
corrupt texts and difficult passages. They had 
nothing in common with that true father of all 
Shakespearean criticism, Mr. Curdle in '' Nicholas 
Nickleby," who had written a treatise on the 
question whether Juliet's nurse's husband was 
really ^*a merry man" or whether it was merely 



CULTURE 369 

his widow's affectionate partiality that induced 
her so to report him. But they knew the whole 
mass of the plays with a wide and generous 
intimacy ; their speech was saturated with the 
immortal diction, and Hamlet's speculations were 
their nearest approach to metaphysics. 

Broadly speaking, all educated people knew the 
English poets down to the end of the eighteenth 
century. Byron and Moore were enjoyed with a 
sort of furtive and fearful pleasure ; and Words- 
worth was tolerated. Every one knew Scott's 
novels by heart, and had his or her favourite 
heroine and hero. 

Then, again, all educated people knew history 
in a broad and comprehensive way. They did not 
concern themselves about ethnological theories, 
influences of race and climate and geography, 
streams of tendency, and the operation of un- 
seen laws ; but they knew all about the great 
people and the great events of time. They were 
conversant with all that was concrete and ascer- 
tainable ; and they took sides as eagerly and as 
definitely in the strifes of Yorkist and Lancas- 
trian, Protestant and Papist, Roundhead and 
Cavalier, as in the controversies over the Reform 
Bill or the Repeal of the Corn Laws. 

Then, again, all educated people knew the laws 

of architecture and of painting ; and, though 

it must be confessed that in these respects 

their views were not very original, still they 

were founded on first-hand knowledge of famous 

2 A 



370 SEEING AND HEARING 

models, and, though conventional, were never 
ignorant. 

But it will be said that all this represents no 
very overwhelming mass of culture, and that, if 
these were all the accomplishments which the 
last generation had to boast of, their successors 
have no reason to dread comparison. 

Well, I expressly said that I was not describing 
learned or even exceptionally well-read people, but 
merely the general level of educated society ; and 
that level is, I am persuaded, infinitely lower than 
it was in former generations. Of course there are 
instances to the contrary which perplex and 
disturb the public judgment, and give rise to 
the delusion that this is a learned age. Thus we 
have in society and politics such scholars as Lord 
Milner and Mr. Asquith and Mr. Herbert Paul ; but 
then there have always been some scholars in 
public life, so there is nothing remarkable in the 
persistence of the type ; whereas, on the other 
hand, the system of smattering and top-dressing 
which pervades Universities and Public Schools 
produces an ever-increasing crop of gentlemen 
who, like Mr. Riley in ^^The Mill on the Floss," 
have brought away with them from Oxford or 
Cambridge a general sense of knowing Latin, 
though their comprehension of any particular 
Latin is not ready. 

It is, I believe, generally admitted that we speak 
French less fluently and less idiomatically than 
our fathers. The *^ barbarous neglect " of Italian, 



CULTURE 371 

which used to rouse Mr. Gladstone's indignation, 
is now complete ; and an even superstitious re- 
spect for the German language is accompanied 
by a curious ignorance of German literature. 1 
remember an excellent picture in Punch which 
depicted that ideal representative of skin-deep 
culture— the Rev. Robert Elsmere— on his knees 
before the sceptical squire, saying, "Pray, pray, 
don't mention the name of another German writer, 
or I shall have to resign my living." 

Then, again, as regards women ; of whom, quite 
as much as of men, I was thinking when I de- 
scribed the culture of bygone society. Here and 
there we see startling instances of erudition which 
throw a reflected and undeserved glory upon the 
undistinguished average. Thus we have seen a 
lady Senior Wrangler and a lady Senior Classic, 
and I myself have the honour of knowing a sweet 
girl-graduate with golden hair, who got two Firsts 
at Oxford. 

The face of the earth is covered with Girls' 
High Schools, and Women's Colleges standing 
where they ought not. I am told, but do not 
know, that girl-undergraduates are permitted to 
witness physiological experiments in the torture- 
dens of science ; and a complete emancipation 
in the matter of reading has introduced women 
to regions of thought and feeling which in old 
days were the peculiar domain of men. The 
results are not far to seek. 

One lady boldly takes the field with an assault 



372 SEEING AND HEARING 

on Christianity; and her apparatus of belated 
criticism and second-hand learning sets all society 
agape. Another fills a novel with morbid path- 
ology, slays the villain by heart-disease, or makes 
the heroine interesting with phthisis ; and people, 
forgetting Mr. Casaubon and Clifford Gray, ex- 
claim, '' How marvellous ! This is, indeed, original 
research." A third, a fourth, and a fifth devote 
themselves to the task of readjusting the relation 
of the sexes, and fill their passionate volumes 
with seduction and lubricity. And here, again, 
just because our mothers did not traffic in these 
wares, the undiscerning public thinks that it has 
discovered a new vein of real though unsavoury 
learning, and ladies say, '^ It is not exactly a 
pleasant book, but one cannot help admiring the 
power." 

Now I submit that these abnormalities are no 
substitute for decent and reasonable culture. 
Pedantry is not learning ; and a vast deal of 
specialism, *^ mugged-up," as boys say, at the 
British Museum and the London Library, may 
co-exist with a profound ignorance of all that is 
really worth knowing. It sounds very intellectual 
to theorize about the authorship of the Fourth 
Gospel, and to scoff at St. John's ^'senile itera- 
tions and contorted metaphysics " ; but, when a 
clergyman read St. Paul's eulogy on Charity in- 
stead of the address at the end of a wedding, 
one of his hearers said, ^* How very appropriate 
that was ! Where did you get it from ? " 



CULTURE 373 

We can all patter about the traces of Bacon's 
influence in ^'The Merry Wives of Windsor," and 
ransack our family histories for the original of 
"Mr. W. H." But, when "Cymbeline" was put 
on the stage, society was startled to find that 
the title-role was not a woman's. A year or two 
ago some excellent scenes from Jane Austen's 
novels were given in a Belgravian drawing-room, 
and a lady of the highest notoriety, enthusiasti- 
cally praising the performance, enquired who was 
the author of the dialogue between Mr. and 
Mrs. John Dashwood, and whether he had written 
Anything else. 

I have known in these later years a judge who 
had never seen the view from Richmond Hill ; 
a publicist who had never heard of Lord Althorp ; 
and an authoress who did not know the name 
of Izaak Walton. But probably the most typical 
illustration of modern culture was the reply of a 
lady who had been enthusing over the Wagnerian 
Cycle, and, when I asked her to tell me quite 
honestly, as between old friends, if she really 
enjoyed it, replied, '* Oh yes ! I think one likes 
Wagner — doesnt one ? " 



LI 

RELIGION 

There once was an Evangelical lady who had 
a Latitudinarian daughter and a Ritualistic son. 
On Sunday morning, when they were forsaking 
the family pew and setting out for their respective 
places of objectionable worship, these graceless 
young people used to join hands and exclaim, 
** Look at us, dear mamma 1 Do we not exem- 
plify what you are so fond of saying, ^ Infidelity 
and superstition, those kindred evils, go hand in 
hand ' ? " 

The combination thus flippantly stated is a 
conspicuous sign of the present times. The decay 
of religion and the increase of superstition are 
among the most noteworthy of the social changes 
which I have seen. 

When I speak of the decay of religion, of 
course I must be understood to refer only to 
external observances. As to interior convictions, 
I have neither the will nor the power to investi- 
gate them. I deal only with the habits of religious 
practice, and in this respect the contrast between 
Then and Now is marked indeed. 

In the first place, grace was then said before 

374 



RELIGION 375 

and after dinner. I do not know that the cere- 
mony was very edifying, but it was traditional 
and respectable. Bishop Wilberforce, in his 
diary, tells of a greedy clergyman who, when 
asked to say grace at a dinner-party, used to vary 
the form according to the character of the wine- 
glasses which he saw before him on the table. 
If they were champagne-glasses, he used to begin 
the benediction with " Bountiful Jehovah " ; but, if 
they were only claret-glasses, he said, *' We are 
not worthy of the least of Thy mercies." 

Charles Kingsley, who generally drew his social 
portraits from actual life, described the impressive 
eloquence of the Rev. Mr. O'Blareaway, who inaug- 
urated an exceptionally good dinner by praying 
'' that the daily bread of our less-favoured brethren 
might be mercifully vouchsafed to them." 

There was a well-remembered squire in Hert- 
fordshire whose love of his dinner was constantly 
at war with his pietistic traditions. He always 
had his glass of sherry poured out before he sate 
down to dinner, so that he might get it without 
a moment's delay. One night, in his generous 
eagerness, he upset the glass just as he dropped 
into his seat at the end of grace, and the formula 
ran on to an unexpected conclusion, thus : '' For 
what we are going to receive the Lord make us 
truly thankful— D n ! " 

But, if the incongruities which attended grace 
before dinner were disturbing, still more so were 
the solemnities of the close. Grace after dinner 



376 SEEING AND HEARING 

always happened at the moment of loudest and 
most general conversation. For an hour and a 
half people had been stuffing as if their lives 
depended on it — ^^ one feeding like forty." After 
a good deal of sherry, the champagne had made 
its tardy appearance, had performed its welcome 
rounds, and had in turn been succeeded by port 
and home-brewed beer. Out of the abundance 
of the mouth the heart speaketh, and every one 
was talking at once, and very loud. Perhaps the 
venue was laid in a fox-hunting country, and 
then the air was full of such voices as these : 
^* Were you out with the squire to-day ? " ^^ Any 
sport ? " '^ Yes, we'd rather a nice gallop." 
'' Plenty of the animal about, I hope?" '^Well, 
I don't know. I believe that new keeper at Bore- 
ham Wood is a vulpicide. I don't half like his 
looks." " What an infernal villain ! A man who 
would shoot a fox would poison his- own grand- 
mother." "Sh! Sh!" ''What's the matter?" 
" For what we have received,'^ &c. 

Or perhaps we are dining in London in the 
height of the season. Fox-hunting is not the 
theme, but the conversation is loud, animated, 
and discursive. A lyrical echo from the summer 
of 1866 is borne back upon my memory — 

Agreeable Rattle, 

This news from abroad is alarming ; 

You've seen the Pall Mall of to-day ! 
Oh ! lima di Murska was charming 

To-night in the Flauto^ they say. 



RELIGION 377 

Not a ghost of a chance for the Tories, 

In spite of Adullam and Lowe ; 
By the bye, have you heard the queer stories 

Of Overend, Gurney and Co. ? " 

Lively Young Lady. Do you know you've been 
talking at the top of your voice all the time grace 
was going on ? 

Agreeable Rattle. Not really ? I'm awfully sorry. 
But our host mumbles so, I never can make out 
what he's saying. 

Lively Young Lady. I can't imagine why people 
don't have grace after dessert. I know I'm much 
more thankful for strawberry ice than for saddle 
of mutton. 

And so on and so forth. On the whole, I am 
not sure that the abolition of grace is a sign of 
moral degeneracy, but I note it as a social change 
which I have seen. 

Another such change is the disuse of Family 
Prayers. In the days of my youth, morning 
prayers at least formed part of the ritual of every 
well-ordered household. The scene recurs vividly 
to the mental eye— the dining-room arranged for 
breakfast, and the master of the house in top-boots 
and breeches with the family Bible in close proxi- 
mity to the urn on the table. Mamma very often 
breakfasted upstairs ; but the sons and daughters of 
the house, perhaps with their toilettes not quite 
complete, came in with a rush just as the proceed- 
ings began, and a long row of maid-servants, 
headed by the housekeeper and supported by the 



378 SEEING AND HEARING 

footmen, were ranged with military precision 
against the opposite wall. In families of a more 
pronouncedly religious tone, evening prayers were 
frequently superadded ; and at ten o'clock the 
assembled guests were aroused from '^ Squails " 
or ^' Consequences " by the entrance of the butler 
with *' Thornton's Family Prayers " on a silver salver. 
In one very Evangelical house which I knew in 
my youth, printed prayers were superseded by ex- 
tempore devotions, and, as the experiment seemed 
successful, the servants were invited to make their 
contributions in their own words. As long as 
only the butler and the housekeeper voiced the 
aspirations of their fellows, all was well ; but, in an 
evil moment, a recalcitrant kitchenmaid uttered 
an unlooked-for petition for her master and 
mistress — ^' And we pray for Sir Thomas and 
her Ladyship. Oh ! may they have now hearts 
given them." And the bare suggestion that there 
was room for such an improvement caused a 
prompt return to the lively oracles of Henry 
Thornton. 

I note the disappearance of the domestic liturgy ; 
and here again, as in the matter of grace, I submit 
that, unless the rite can be decently, reasonably, 
and reverently performed, it is more honoured 
in the breach than in the observance. 

Much more significant is the secularization of 
Sunday. This is not merely a change, but a 
change conspicuously for the worse. The amount 
of church-going always differed in different circles ; 



RELIGION 379 

religious people went often and careless people 
went seldom, but almost every one went some- 
times, if merely from a sense of duty and de- 
corum. Mr. Gladstone, whose traditions were 
Evangelical, thought very poorly of what he called 
a ''once-er/' i,e. a person who attended divine 
service only once on a Sunday. He himself was 
always a "twice-er," and often a ^^ thrice-er " ; but 
to-day it would puzzle the social critic to discover 
a ''twice-er," and even a *'once-er" is sufficiently 
rare to be noticeable. 

But far more serious than the decay of mere 
attendance at church is the complete abolition of 
the Day of Rest. People, who have nothing to 
do but to amuse themselves, work at that en- 
trancing occupation with redoubled energy on 
Sundays. If they are in London, they whirl off 
to spend the "week-end" amid the meretricious 
splendours of the stockbroker's suburban para- 
dise ; and, if they are entertaining friends at their 
country houses, they play bridge or tennis or 
croquet ; they row, ride, cycle, and drive, spend 
the afternoon in a punt, and wind up the evening 
with ''The Washington Post." 

All this is an enormous change since the days 
when the only decorous amusement for Sunday 
was a visit after church to the stables, or a walk 
in the afternoon to the home farm or the kitchen 
garden ; and, of course, it entails a correspond- 
ing amount of labour for the servants. Maids 
and valets spend the '' week-end " in a whirl of 



38o SEEING AND HEARING 

packing and unpacking, and the whole staff of 
the kitchen is continuously employed. 

In old days people used to reduce the meals 
on Sunday to the narrowest dimensions, in order 
to give the servants their weekly due of rest and 
recreation, and in a family with which I am 
connected the traditional bill of fare for Sunday's 
dinner, drawn by a cook who lived before the 
School Board, is still affectionately remembered — 

Soup. 

Cold Beef. 

Salad. 

Cold Sweats. 

In brief, respectable people used to eat and 
drink sparingly on Sunday, caused no unnecessary 
work, went a good deal to church, and filled up 
their leisure time by visiting sick people in the 
cottages or teaching in the Sunday School. No 
doubt there was a trace of Puritan strictness 
about the former practice, and people too gener- 
ally forgot that the First Day of the week is by 
Christian tradition a feast. Society has redis- 
covered that great truth. It observes the weekly 
feast by over-eating itself, and honours the day 
of rest by over-working its dependants. 



LII 

SUPERSTITION 

" Superstition and infidelity usually go together. 
Professed atheists have trafficked in augury, and 
men who do not believe in God will believe in 
ghosts." To-day I take up my parable concern- 
ing superstition, to which, time out of mind, the 
human spirit has betaken itself as soon as it parted 
company with faith. 

I once asked a lady who, in her earlier life, had 
lived in the very heart of society, and who returned 
to it after a long absence, what was the change 
which struck her most forcibly. She promptly 
replied, ^^The growth of superstition. I hear 
people seriously discussing ghosts. In my day 
people who talked in that way would have been 
put in Bedlam ; their relations would have required 
no other proof that they were mad." 

My own experience entirely confirms this testi- 
mony as to the development of superstition, and 
I have had some peculiarly favourable oppor- 
tunities of observing its moral effect upon its 
votaries. The only superstition tolerated in my 
youth was table-turning, and that was always 

treated as more than half a joke. To sit in a 

381 



382 SEEING AND HEARING 

darkened room round a tea-table, secretly join 
hands under the mahogany, and ''communicate 
a revolving motion " to it (as Mr. Pickwick to 
his fists) was not bad fun when the company was 
mainly young and larky, but contained one or two 
serious people who desired to probe the mystery 
to its depths. Or, perhaps, our psychic force 
would cause the respectable piece of furniture 
to rear itself upon one leg, and deal out with 
a ponderous foot mysterious raps, which the 
serious people interpreted with their own admir- 
able solemnity. I well remember a massive gentle- 
man with an appalling stammer who proclaimed 
that some lost document which we had asked the 
table to discover would be found in the Vatican 
Library, ''wrapped in a ragged palimpsest of 
Tertullian ; " and the quaintness of the utterance 
dissolved the tables, or at least the table-turners, 
in laughter. This particular form of superstition 
became discredited among respectable people when 
sharpers got hold of it and used it as an engine 
for robbing the weak-minded. It died, poor thing, 
of exposure, and its epitaph was written by Brown- 
ing in " Mr. Sludge, the Medium." 

It was the same with ghost-stories. People 
told them — partly to fill gaps when reasonable 
conversation failed, and partly for the fun of 
making credulous hearers stare and gasp. But 
no one, except ladies as weak-minded as Byng's 
Half-Aunt in " Happy Thoughts," ever thought of 
taking them seriously. Bishop Wilberforce in- 



SUPERSTITION 383 

vented a splendid story about a priest and a 
sliding panel and a concealed confession ; and I 
believe that he habitually used it as a foolometer, 
to test the mental capacity of new acquaintances. 
But the Bishop belonged to that older generation 
which despised superstition, and during the last 
few years, twaddle of this kind has risen to the 
dignity of a pseudo-science. 

Necromancy is a favourite substitute for re- 
ligion. It supplies the element of mystery with- 
out which the human spirit cannot long subsist ; 
and, as it does not require its adherents to prac- 
tise self-denial, or get up early on Sunday, or 
subscribe to charities, or spend their leisure in 
evil-smelling slums, it is a cult particularly well 
adapted to a self-indulgent age. I vividly re- 
member a scene which occurred just before the 
Coronation. A luxurious luncheon had been pro- 
longed by the aid of coffee, kiimmel, and cigarettes 
till four o'clock ; and the necromancers — surfeited, 
flushed, and a little maudlin — were lolling round 
the drawing-room fire. A whispered colloquy in a 
corner was heard through the surrounding chatter, 
and the hostess saw her opportunity. " Dear 
Lady De Spook, do let us hear. I know you are 
such a wonderful medium." 

Lady De Spook, Really, it was nothing at all 
out of the common. I had come home dead tired 
from the opera, and just as I was going to bed I 
heard that rap — you know what I mean ? 

Mr. Sludge (enthusiastically). Oh yes, indeed 



384 SEEING AND HEARING 

I do ! No one who has ever heard it can ever 
forget it. 

Lady De Spook (resuming). Well, and do you 
know it turned out to be poor dear Lord De 
Spook. It was wonderful how energetically he 
rapped, for you know he was quite paralysed 
years before he died ; and the curious thing was 
that I couldn't make out what he said. It seemed 
to be, '' Don't buy. Sarah. Search." I was too 
tired to go on talking to him, so I went to bed ; 
but next day, do you know, my maid found the 
coronet which his first wife, whose name was 
Sarah, had worn at the last coronation. I was 
just going to order a new one. Wasn't it a 
wonderful interposition ! — Such a saving ! 

Chorus (sentimentally). Ah, wonderful indeed ! 
Our dear ones are never really lost to us. 

Closely connected with necromancy is clair- 
voyance. A man whom I knew well was taken 
suddenly and seriously ill, and his relations, who 
were enthusiastic spookists, telegraphed for the 
celebrated clairvoyante Mrs. Endor. She duly 
arrived, threw herself into a trance, declared that 
the patient would die, came to, and declared that 
there was nothing much the matter, and that he 
would be about again in two or three days. 
Then, having pocketed her cheque, she returned 
to London. The patient grew rapidly worse, and 
died ; and his relations, though I am sure they 
sincerely mourned him, were much sustained in 
the hour of bereavement by the thought that the 



SUPERSTITION 385 

opinion which Mrs. Endor had given in her trance 
had proved to be the right one, and that spiritual 
science was justified by the result. 

But, after all, necromancy and clairvoyance 
are a little old-fashioned. Crystal-gazing is more 
modish. 'Tis as easy as lying. You gather open- 
mouthed round a glass ball, and the gifted gazer 
reports that which he or she can see, but which 
is invisible to grosser eyes. There are no bounds 
to the fascinating range of a crystal-gazer's fancy, 
nor to the awe-struck credulity with which his 
revelations are received. 

But crystal is not the only medium through 
which a purged eye can discern the mysterious 
future. Coffee-grounds, though less romantic, 
are very serviceable. Our hostess is an expert 
in this form of science, and, being a thoroughly 
amiable woman, she makes the coffee say pretty 
much what we should like to hear. '^ Dear Mr. 
Taper, this is delightful. You will be Prime 
Minister before you die. It is true that your 
party will not be in office again just yet ; but 
* hope on, hope ever,' and trust your star." 

^* Oh ! Mr. Garbage, I have such good news 
for you. Your next book will be an immense 
success, and, after that, Messrs. Skin & Flint will 
be more liberal, and, what with the American 
copyright and the acting rights, you will make 
quite a fortune." 

Closely akin to the science of coffee-grounds 
is that of palmistry. A wretched gipsy who '' tells 

2 B 



386 SEEING AND HEARING 

fortunes" at a race-meeting is sent to prison; 
but, when St. Berengaria's gets up a bazaar for 
its new vestry, a bejewelled lady sits in a secret 
chamber (for admission to which an extra half- 
crown is charged), and, after scrutinizing your 
line of life, tells you that you have had the in- 
fluenza ; and, projecting her soul into futurity, 
predicts that the next time you have it you will 
get pneumonia unless you are very careful. 

Of course, these minor superstitions are mainly 
ridiculous, and to get up moral indignation over 
them would be a waste of force. But one can- 
not speak so lightly of the degrading cults which 
are grouped together under the name of Spiritual- 
ism. I have known a ** Spiritual Wife" who was 
highly commended in spookish circles because 
she left her husband, family, and home in one 
continent and crossed the world to find her 
*' affinity" in another. I have known a most 
promising boy whose health was destroyed and 
his career ruined by a hypnotic experiment per- 
formed on him without his parents' knowledge. 
I have known a mesmeric clergyman who cozened 
the women of his congregation out of money, 
character, and in some cases reason. Where 
occultism is pursued, all veracity and self-respect 
disappear; pruriency finds a congenial lodgment, 
and the issue is — well — what we sometimes see 
exhibited in all its uncomeliness at the Central 
Criminal Court. 

The wisest lawgiver who ever lived said, " Thou 



SUPERSTITION 387 

shall not suffer a witch to Hve." And a great 
judge acted on the rule. But that was a long 
time ago. We have improved upon the jurisprud- 
ence of Moses and the methods of Sir Matthew 
Hale. Stoning and hanging are a little out of 
date, but boycotting is a remedy still within our 
reach. Whoso is wise will ponder these things, 
and will give occultists, male and female, an un- 
commonly wide berth. 



LIII 

THE REMNANT 

Some recent observations of mine on the de- 
terioration of society have drawn this interesting 
response from an eminent clergyman in the 
north of London : — 

" Is it possible that in * Society * itself there is a 
point of resistance which may be touched by an 
effective appeal coming from the wholesomer 
elements in English life ? Belonging as I do 
to that section of English life which is a stranger 
to Society in the technical sense, I am deeply 
impressed with the taint which comes to all 
circles of society from the contamination of the 
circle at the top. To elicit a strong opinion and 
a resolute determination from what I may call 
the Puritan side of English life, may be perhaps 
the first step towards the correction of the evil 
which Mr. Russell describes. Are there not in 
Society itself some men and women who retain 
the high ideals and the strenuous purposes of 
their ancestry ? Can they be induced to raise 
their protest, to assert their principles, and open 
the way to a better — because a purer — future ? 
I venture to make this appeal because it is my 



THE REMNANT 389 

fixed conviction that even in the worst and most 
degraded society there are men who sigh for 
better things, just as in the worst and most de- 
graded men there remains a desire, however over- 
laid, for regeneration." 

Well, frankly I think that an amiable insanity 
deludes my reverend friend if he expects a moral 
reformation in the sort of society which I have 
been describing. It would tax the combined 
energies of St. John the Baptist, Savonarola, the 
two Wesleys, and George Whitefield, all rolled 
into one, to convince the people whom I have 
in my mind of their ethical shortcomings. They 
have made their own beds, in every sense of 
that expressive phrase, and must lie on them till 
the cataclysm comes which will bring us all to 
our senses. 

But I am reminded that I promised to write 
not exclusively about deteriorations in society, 
but about changes of all kinds. That there 
has been some change for the better I readily 
admit, as well as an enormous number of changes 
for the worse. ''All things are double," says the 
Son of Sirach, ''one against the other," and in 
this closing chapter I will try to balance our gains 
and our losses. 

That there has always been a mixture of good 
and bad in society is only another way of saying 
that society is part of mankind ; but, if I am 
right in my survey, the bad just now is flagrant 
and ostentatious to a degree which we have not 



390 SEEING AND HEARING 

known in England since 1837. There was once 
a moralist who spoke of the narrow path which 
lay between right and wrong, and similarly there 
used to be a Debatable Land which lay between 
the good and evil districts of society. It was 
inhabited by the people who, having no ethical 
convictions of their own, go very much as they 
are led. It was written of them long ago that — 

*'They eat, they drink, they sleep, they plod, 
They go to church on Sunday ; 
And many are afraid of God, 
And more of Mrs. Grundy." 

As long as Mrs. Grundy was a real, though 
comical, guardian of social propriety — as long 
as the highest influences in the social system 
tended towards virtue and decorum — the inhabi- 
tants of the Debatable Land were even painfully 
respectable. But now that the ^' trend" (as 
Pennialinus calls it) is all the other way, and 
Mrs. Grundy has been deposed as a bore and 
an anachronism, they willingly follow the ''smart" 
multitude to do evil ; and so the area covered 
by social wickedness is much larger than in 
former times. In other words, the evil of society 
is both worse in quality and larger in quantity 
than it was fifty — or even twenty — years ago. 

Now if this be true — and I hold it to be un- 
questionable — what have we to set against it ? I 
reply, the greatly increased activity of those who 
are really good. In old days the good were 



THE REMNANT 391 

good in a quiescent and lethargic way. They 
were punctual in religious observances, public 
and private ; exemplary in the home and the 
family, and generous to the poor. But their 
religion could scarcely be called active, except 
in so far as pottering about among the cottages, 
or teaching a class of well-washed children in 
the Sunday School, can be reckoned as active 
employments ; and even such activities as these 
were as a rule confined to women. 

Sir Walter Scott believed that *' there were 
few young men, and those very sturdy moralists, 
who would not rather be taxed with some moral 
peccadillo than with want of horsemanship." 
And, in days much more recent than the be- 
loved Sir Walter's, men, if they were religious, 
studiously kept their light under a bushel, and 
took the utmost pains to avoid being detected in 
acts of charity or devotion. 

Nowadays all this is changed, and changed, in 
my opinion, much for the better. Religious 
people are ready to let the world know what 
they believe, and are active in the pursuit of 
the things which are pure and lovely and of 
good report. Well-dressed young men combine 
dancing with slumming. Untidiness and dulness 
are no longer the necessary concomitants of 
virtue. Officers of the Guards sing in the choir 
and serve the altar. Men whose names are 
written in the book of the peerage as well as 
the Book of Life conduct Bible-classes and hand 



392 SEEING AND HEARING 

round the hymn-books at mission-services. The 
group of young M.P.'s who were nicknamed 
''HughHgans" showed the astonished House of 
Commons that ReHgion is as practical a thing 
as Pontics, and (as one of them lately said) they 
cheerfully encountered that hot water which is 
the modern substitute for boiling oil. The Uni- 
versities send their best atheletes and social 
favourites to curacies in the slums or martyrdom 
in the mission-field. The example set by Mr. 
James Adderley, when he left Christ Church and 
founded the Oxford House at Bethnal Green, 
has been followed in every direction. Both the 
Universities, and most of the colleges, run ^' Settle- 
ments," where laymen, in the intervals of profes- 
sional work and social enjoyment, spread religion, 
culture, and physical education amid the ^Mim, 
common populations " of Camberwell and Strat- 
ford and Poplar. 

The Public Schools, formerly denounced as 
^'the seats and nurseries of vice," make their full 
contribution to active religion. Eton and Win- 
chester and Harrow have their Missions in 
crowded quarters of great towns. At one school, 
the boys have a guild of devotion ; at another, a 
voluntary Bible-class with which no master inter- 
meddles. And so the young citizens of the 
privileged order gain their first lessons in religious 
and social service, and carry the idea with them 
to the Army or the Bar or the Stock Exchange 
or the House of Commons. All this is, in my 



THE REMNANT 393 

eyes, a social change which is also a clear and 
enormous gain. 

But, if what I say is true of men, it is even 
more conspicuously true of women. They are 
no longer content with the moderate church- 
going at comfortable hours, and the periodical 
visits to particularly clean cottages, which at one 
time were the sum-total of their activities. Every 
well-organized parish has its staff of woman- 
workers, who combine method with enthusiasm 
and piety with common sense. Belgravia and 
Mayfair send armies of district-visitors to Hoxton 
and Poplar. Girls from fashionable homes, pretty 
and well dressed, sacrifice their evenings to clubs 
and social gatherings for factory-hands and maids- 
of-all-work. Beneath the glittering surface of 
social life, there is a deep current of wise and 
devoted effort for those unhappy beings who are 
least able to help themselves. And all this philan- 
thropic energy is distinctively and avowedly Chris- 
tian. It is the work of men and women, young 
and old, widely differentiated from one another in 
outward circumstances of wealth and accomplish- 
ments and social influence, but all agreed about 
"the one thing needful," and all keen to confess 
their faith before a hostile world. 

What, then, is the conclusion of the whole 
matter? Society, during the years in which I 
have known it, has changed enormously, alike 
in its exterior characteristics and, as far as I can 
judge, in its inner spirit. While some of the 

2 >-' 



394 SEEING AND HEARING 

changes have been simply innocuous, and a few 
even beneficial, the great majority have been 
gross and palpable deteriorations. An onlooker 
who knew society well thus described its present 
condition : ** We are living in an age of decadence, 
and we pretend not to know it. There is not a 
feature wanting, though we cannot mention the 
worst of them. We are Romans of the worst 
period, given up to luxury and effeminacy, and 
caring for nothing but money. We care no more 
for beauty in art, but only for a brutal realism. 
Sport has lost its manliness, and is a matter of 
pigeons from a trap, or a mountain of crushed 
pheasants to sell to your own tradesmen. Religion 
is coming down to jugglers and table-turnings 
and philanderings with cults brought, like the 
rites of I sis, from the East ; and as for patriotism, 
it is turned on like beer at election times, or 
worked like a mechanical doll by wire-pullers. 
We belong to one of the most corrupt genera- 
tions of the human race. To find its equal one 
must go back to the worst times of the Roman 
Empire, and look devilish close then. But it's 
uncommonly amusing to live in an age of deca- 
dence ; you see the funniest sights and you get 
every conceivable luxury, and you die before the 
irruption of the barbarians." 

This is, I believe, a true indictment against the 
age in which our lot is cast, although the utterance 
has just that touch of exaggeration which secures 
a hearing for unpalatable truth. But the man who 



THE REMNANT 395 

wrote it left out of account that redeeming element 
in our national life which I have discussed in this 
closing chapter. After all, there is a world-wide 
difference between the *^ Majority" and the '* Rem- 
nant," — and the ten righteous men may yet save 
the guilty city. 



POSTSCRIPT 

The bulk of this book appeared in the " Manchester 
Guardian" and my thanks are due to Mr. C, P. 
Scott for permission to reproduce it. The last twelve 
chapters were originally published under the title^ 
" For Better P For Worse ? " and they reappear by 
the kind consent of Mr, Fisher Unwin. 

G, IV. E, R. 

Twelfth Nighty 1907. 



Printed by Ballantyne. Hanson St* Co. 
Edinburgh A' London 



^ 



Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process. 
Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
Treatment Date: May 2009 

PreservationTechnologies 

A WORLD LEADER IN COLLECTIONS PRESERVATION 

111 Thomson Park Drive 

Cranhprrv Tnwn<;hin PA iRflRR 






LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 




014 529 261 A 



